CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
1.
OBJECTIVES AND OUTLINE
This book investigates the syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic properties of
the diverse families of constructions in Japanese in which the verbal suffix -te
appears as a linking device. Henceforth, the suffix itself will be represented
as TE, and the constructions will be referred to as TE-constructions or, collectively, as TE-linkage. A detailed analysis of TE-linkage is of special significance to linguistic theory because it inevitably involves the search for an
adequate descriptive framework for representing connectives, which are
inherently relational linguistic objects.
A minimum requirement for such a framework is the provision of vocabulary and concepts sufficient to describe the following concerns:
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
Grammatical categories of the two linked constituents: e.g. verb-verb,
clause-clause, noun-clause, verb-clause.
Syntactic relationship obtaining between the linked constituents: e.g.
coordination, subordination.
Presence or absence of obligatory control: e.g. identity of subject between the linked constituents.
Presence or absence of dependency between the linked constituents
regarding grammatical operators: e.g. negation, tense, mood.
Semantic constraints, if any, on the linked constituents: e.g. agentivity,
telicity, negative/positive polarity.
Potential semantic relations expressed by the linkage: e.g. cause-effect,
means-end, conditional, concessive.
Relationships, if any, between syntactic and semantic structures associated with a particular linkage.
The theoretical framework employed in this study is a hybrid of Role
and Reference Grammar (Van Valin and Foley 1980, Foley and Van Valin
1984, Van Valin 1990, 1993, inter alia) and Construction Grammar (Fillmore
1986b, 1988, Lambrecht 1986, G. Lakoff 1987, Brugman 1988, Fillmore,
Kay, and O’Connor 1988, inter alia).
The organization of the book is as follows. In the balance of Chapter 1,
2
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
first the morphological characteristics of TE and the conventional taxonomy
of TE-constructions are provided. Then, the problems of the traditional coordination-subordination dichotomy are taken up. Because TE-linkage exhibits essential properties of both coordination and subordination, a third
category, cosubordination, is introduced. Finally, the issue of how the
meaning of connectives should be captured in linguistic description is discussed. It is argued that (i) even though most semantic relations between
TE-linked constituents are inferable from the meaning of the constituents
alone, they nevertheless must be considered semantic properties of the
TE-linkage itself; (ii) the notion of grammatical construction, i.e. a pairing of
a syntactic pattern with a meaning structure, is needed for an adequate description of TE-linkage because some constraints on the conjuncts apply
neither to the syntactic structure of the TE-linkage nor to the semantic relation
between the constituents, but to the pairing of the two.
Chapter 2 presents a synopsis of Role and Reference Grammar with
special focus on its application to the facts of Japanese linking structures. It
introduces such notions as the layered structure of the clause, i.e. nucleus,
core, and clause (§1), focus structures (§2), operators (§3), juncture and
nexus (§4), linkage types (§5), and the lexical representation of verbals and
thematic relations (§6).
Chapters 3 to 6 are devoted to the detailed analysis of TE-constructions;
Chapters 3 and 4 deal with TE-linkage at the nuclear level, Chapter 5 at the
core level, and Chapter 6 at the clause level. Concluding remarks follow in
Chapter 7.
2.
MORPHOSYNTACTIC CHARACTERISTICS OF
TE-LINKAGE
2.1 Verbal Suffix TE
TE is attached to the stem of a verbal (verb or adjective), thereby casting the
verbal and its preceding grammatical dependents as part of a complex construction. The resultant combination VERBAL+TE has been variously referred to as a gerund (Bloch 1946, Martin 1975), gerundive (Kuno 1973),
past participle (Teramura 1969), or TE-form (most textbooks of Japanese).
From a crosslinguistic perspective, TE-linkage falls under the broader category of clause-chaining: the VERBAL+TE is similar to the converb of numerous Central Asian languages. Although VERBAL+TE exhibits some
similarities with the gerund of Indo-European and other languages, e.g. Archi
(Northeast Caucasian, Kibrik 1988), it cannot in principle function as a
nominal, and indeed in some uses TE functions very much like the English
conjunction and. In this book, accordingly, I adhere to the traditional and
Chapter 1: Introduction
3
noncommittal analysis of TE as simply a connective suffix.
As with the past-tense/perfective suffix -ta, TE participates in a number
of assimilatory morphophonemic processes that respond to the final consonant of a consonant-final verb stem. For example, aw- ‘meet’+ TE>atte, kaer‘go home’+TE>kaette, tat- ‘stand’+TE>tatte, and kak- ‘write’+TE>kaite.
When the verb stem ends in a voiced obstruent, TE is voiced, e.g. yob‘call’+TE>yonde, and oyog- ‘swim’+TE>oyoide. These morphophonemic
details are relevant in this study only insofar as they may help the reader to
recognize the presence of TE in any given example.
Although TE-linked sentences are frequently translated into English
with a present participle, e.g. (1), TE-linkage is significantly different both
from free adjuncts, e.g. ‘Inflating her lungs, Mary screamed’ and from absolutes, e.g. ‘The coach being crowded, Fred had to stand’ (both from
Kortmann 1991:5), in that TE-linkage is iterable, as shown in (1c).
(1) a.zyon wa [uwagi o
nuide]
[hangaa ni
kaketa].
John TOP jacket ACC take.off-TE hanger LOC hung
‘John, TAKING OFF his jacket, hung it on a hanger.’
(Kuno 1973:200; transcription modified)
b. zyon wa [terebi o
mite]
[benkyoosita].
John TOP TV
ACC
watch-TE studied
‘John studied, WATCHING TV./HAVING watched TV, John
studied.’
(Harasawa 1994:182; slightly modified)
c.[hi
ni
kazasite]
[mizu o
zyoohatu-sasete]
flame LOC hold.up-TE water ACC evaporate-TE
[hutatabi omosa o
hakaru].
again
weight ACC measure
‘BY HOLDING (it) over the flame, evaporate the water and weigh
(it) again.’
This syntactic property of iterability is another reason why TE must be conceptualized as a connective suffix rather than as a particle that creates gerunds
or participles. Semantically and pragmatically, however, TE-linkage exhibits
many similarities with free adjuncts and absolutes in English.
In Classical Japanese, TE was attached to the ren’yoo form of a verbal, a
nonfinite inflectional form ending in the vowel /i/ or /e/. (The apostrophe in
ren’yoo indicates a syllable break.) Bloch (1946) translates the neutral term
ren’yoo form as infinitive, Teramura (1969) as present participle, and Kuno
(1973) as continuative. I will use the term ren’yoo form to avoid potential
confusion arising from the variety of translations. In some poetic expressions,
TE can still follow the ren’yoo form even today, with no morphophonemic
4
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
assimilation — e.g. ikite kaerazu ‘be gone and never return’ and kage o sitaite
‘yearning for your shadow’. (Ik- ‘go’+TE and sitaw- ‘yearn’+TE are realized
in Modern Japanese as itte and sitatte, respectively.)
The copula+TE is realized as de, which is identical with its ren’yoo
form. In Classical Japanese, the ren’yoo form of the copula was ni; thus
sizuka ‘quiet’ (adjectival noun)+ni ‘be’ (ren’yoo) +TE was sizuka ni te. The
same phrase is realized as sizuka de in Modern Japanese.
Historically, TE itself originated from the ren’yoo form of the auxiliary
verb tu, which marked perfective aspect (Yamada 1954).1 Tu is obsolete in
Modern Japanese, however.
2.2 Conventional Categorization of TE-Constructions
Traditionally, TE-constructions have been divided into three categories according to the function of TE: (i) as a nonproductive derivational suffix, as in
(2a); (ii) as a linker connecting a main verb with a so-called auxiliary to form
a complex predicate,2 as in (2b); and (iii) as a linker connecting two phrases
or clauses, as in (2c).
(2) a.korera no
samazama-na gensyoo
o
these
GEN
various
phenomenon ACC
siite
hitotu no
gensyoo
to
boldly (=force-TE) one
GEN
phenomenon QUOT
site
mitai.
[Amerika]
do-TE want.to.consider
‘I dare consider these various phenomena as a single phenomenon.’
b. nihon-sya
ga
ippai
hasitte
Japanese.car NOM many run-TE
Lit. ‘Many Japanese cars are running.’
‘There are Japanese cars everywhere.’
iru.
be-NPST
[Amerika]
c.mina
kawaki to
nemuke
ni
taete
everyone thirst
and sleepiness DAT endure-TE
same
no
oyogu araumi
o
hyooryuu sita.
1 This analysis is widely accepted by many, but not all, Japanese linguists.
cording to Matsuo (1936), TE has been a connective particle from the very
Acbe-
ginning.
2 There are more than ten such ‘auxiliary’ verbs that may appear as second constituent
in this second category of TE-constructions; the exact number varies
the analyst.
according to
Chapter 1: Introduction
5
shark GEN swim rough.sea ACC
drifted
‘Enduring thirst and sleeplessness, they drifted on the rough seas
where sharks sometimes swam.’
[Tsushimamaru]
In the first category, TE functions as a derivational suffix, forming an
adverb from a verb. Siite in (2a) could be analyzed as the verb sii‘force’+TE; however, siite in this usage does not have any valence of its own,
i.e., it has no subject or object. In general, in this category verbs lose much of
their verbal nature when TE is attached. Furthermore, the meaning of a derived adverbial is not always predictable from the meaning of the base verb.
Siite ‘boldly/dare (do something)’ must therefore be listed as such in the
lexicon.3 (If siite were to take overt or covert arguments, on the other hand, it
would belong to the second or third category.) Because the semantic import
of the derivational process associated with TE in this function is irregular and
nonproductive, and in particular because TE does not function here as a true
connective, this first category will not be considered further in the present
study.
In the second category, exemplified by (2b), the verb preceding TE is
semantically the main predicate of the clause, and the verb or adjective that
follows TE is a so-called auxiliary.4 For example, ‘VERB-TE i-’ in (2b) is the
grammatical means for expressing the progressive (im-perfective) aspect.
The semantic relations between the linked constituents in this second category are relatively fixed, compared with the third category, and are in large
part determined by the second constituent. Syntactically, on the other hand,
some TE-constructions in this category raise serious questions. For example,
when ar- ‘be (located)’ is the second constituent, the construction as a whole
becomes intransitive even if the ‘main verb’ is transitive. The current trend in
syntactic theories is to treat such grammatical-function-changing processes as
3 Other examples of this type are: aratame- ‘renovate’+TE>aratamete ‘on
another
occasion’, hatas- ‘accomplish’+TE>hatasite ‘really’, hazime- ‘begin’+ TE >hazimete
‘for the first time’, itar- ‘reach’+TE>itatte ‘extremely’, kiwame- ‘go to the
end’+TE>kiwamete ‘to a high degree’, and sitagaw- ‘follow’+TE>
sitagatte
‘therefore’. Some lexical items in this category do have a partial valence, appearing
with an NP other than the subject or object. In such a case, they form an adverbial
phrase: e.g. NP ni totte ‘for NP’, NP ni yotte ‘by NP’, and NP to site ‘as NP’, the last of
which appears in (2a).
4 In classical Transformational Grammar (e.g. D. Smith 1970, Nakau 1973, M. Inoue
1974), as well as in many current syntactic theories (e.g. McCawley and Momoi 1986,
Shibatani 1977, Lee 1989, Sells 1990, Y. Matsumoto 1990b), the second verb is
considered to be the main verb; it takes the first verb as (head of) its sentential or VP
complement.
6
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
lexical, i.e. to consider ‘VERB-TE ar-’ as a lexical unit. However, there is no
syntactic evidence to support such an analysis (cf. Chapter 3 §3).
The semantic relations between the linked constituents in the third
category are so diverse that no single relation can be considered central. In
(2c), for example, the first clause holds a CIRCUMSTANCE relation to the
second; however, as shown in (3), many other relations can also be expressed
by TE-linked constituents, e.g. ADDITIVE, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE,
CAUSE-EFFECT (CAUSE for short), MEANS-END (MEANS for short),
CONTRASTIVE, CONCESSIVE, and CONDITIONAL.5 (These relations are
provided here solely for purposes of exposition; whether or not all these
relations need be posited in the description of TE-linkage is a separate issue.
Note also that TEMPORAL SEQUENCE is included here only provisionally; in
Chapter 6 it will be shown that the TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation proper is
in fact incompatible with TE-linkage.)
(3) a.ADDITIVE
kono utyuu
no
soodai na sungeki wa
this universe GEN grand
drama
TOP
setunakute
sinpiteki
da.
be.oppressive-TE mysterious COP-NPST
‘This grand drama of the universe [an eclipse] is oppressive AND
mysterious.’
[Nisshoku]
b. TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
hurasuko ni
kitai o
irete,
hutatabi
flask
LOC
gas
ACC
put-TE again
hakaru.
measure
‘Put the gas into the flask AND weigh (it) again.’
omosa o
weight ACC
[Rika]
c.CAUSE
tomodati
o
izimete
sensee
ni
sikarareta.
friend
ACC
bother-TE
teacher DAT scold-PASS-PST
‘(I) was scolded by the teacher BECAUSE (I) bothered (my) friend.’
(Endô 1982)
5 Minami (1974) categorizes Japanese connectives into three groups based on various
co-occurrence restrictions: nagara, tutu ‘while doing’ (A type); node ‘because’, temo
‘although, even though’, to ‘and’ (B type); ga ‘and, but’, kara ‘because’, keredo
‘but’, si ‘and’ (C type). According to Minami, subtypes of TE appear in all three
categories.
Chapter 1: Introduction
7
d. MEANS
hi
ni kazasite
mizu o
zyoohatu saseru. [Rika]
flame LOC hold.up-TE water ACC evaporate
‘BY HOLDING (it [the spoon]) over the flame, evaporate the
water.’
e.CONTRASTIVE
maki wa gookaku site hiro wa hugookaku
TOP pass-TE
TOP disqualification
‘Maki passed (the exam), BUT Hiro was disqualified.’
datta.
COP-PST
f. CONCESSIVE
kare wa
sono koto
o
sitte ite
iwanai.
he
TOP
that matter ACC know-TE say-NEG-NPST
‘ALTHOUGH he knows the subject matter, (he) won’t say it.’
(Morita 1980)
g. CONDITIONAL
zenbu tabete 20-doru desu.
all
eat-TE $20
COP-NPST(POL)
‘IF (you) eat everything, (it) is $20.’
The prevailing view is that, because of this diversity of semantic relations, TE-linkage has no intrinsic meaning of its own and that the interpreter
must rather infer the intended semantic relationship based on extralinguistic
knowledge (Alfonso 1966, Teramura 1981, Endô 1982, Gray 1983, Himeno
1984, Ogoshi 1988). The validity of this claim will be discussed later in this
chapter. We now turn to the issue of how to represent the syntactic relationship obtaining between the TE-linked constituents.
2.3.
Coordination-Subordination Dichotomy
2.3.1.
Definitions
Multi-clausal or phrasal sentences have traditionally been categorized and
characterized in terms of the familiar coordination-subordination dichotomy.
Bloomfield (1933:194) defines a coordinative construction formed with and
as one type of endocentric construction, in which ‘the resultant phrase belongs to the same form-class as two or more of the constituents.’ His definition of form-class is: ‘All forms which can fill a given position thereby
constitute a form-class’ (185), and elsewhere ‘All forms having the same
functions constitute a form-class’ (159). Function is defined in these terms:
8
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘The positions in which a form can appear are its functions or, collectively, its
function’ (185).
Dik (1968) criticizes Bloomfield for inconsistency, providing the following examples: ‘I want to emphasize this and also that you should never
forget what your father told you’ (coordination of a pronoun and a complement clause); and ‘He felt quite happy and at ease in his new surroundings’
(coordination of an adjective and a prepositional phrase) (28). 6 If we adhere
to Bloomfield’s definitions, these sentences lead to the startling conclusion
that pronouns and complement clauses must belong to the same form-class,
and likewise adjectives and prepositional phrases. However, in general these
pairs of linguistic objects do not appear in the same positions. Thus, if the
Bloomfieldian conception is employed, form-classes must be defined relative
to particular sentences or sentence-types — which is an untenable consequence.
Dik contends that the conception of function as a purely distributional
notion must therefore be abandoned. He defines coordination rather as the
linkage of two or more constituents which are equivalent in grammatical
function, e.g. subject, object, and predicative or attributive modifier. For his
definition of grammatical function he turns to Longacre, who states: ‘By
function is meant the particular office or role of one distinguishable part of a
construction type in relation to other parts of the same construction’
(1965:65).
Quirk et al. (1985), who adopt the Bloomfieldian approach to coordination, define subordination as embedding with or without a subordinating
conjunction. Lyons, on the other hand, appeals to the notion of grammatical
dependency: ‘Complex sentences are divided into: (a) those in which the
constituent clauses are grammatically co-ordinate, no one being dependent
on the others, but all being, as it were, added together in sequence ... and (b)
those in which one of the clauses (the “main clause”) is “modified” by one or
more subordinate clauses grammatically dependent upon it’ (1968:178).
2.3.2.
Problems
As has been pointed out in recent linguistic literature (Haiman and Thompson
1984, Van Valin 1984, Roberts 1988), the coordination-subordination dichotomy is inadequate for cross-linguistic investigation. In the case of
6 Charles Fillmore has pointed out that at ease in the second example is only superficially a prepositional phrase: it has the internal syntax of a PP but the external syntax
of an adjective. As with adjectives, at ease can collocate with the degree adverb
quite.
Chapter 1: Introduction
9
TE-linkage, for instance, sentences exhibit characteristics of both coordina-
tion and subordination.7 Semantically, sentence (4) appears to be a prototypical example of coordination; yet the predicate of the first conjunct is
nonfinite (which cannot occur by itself), and the second finite. Syntactically,
the construction is thus neither distributionally nor functionally an instance of
coordination.
(4) maki wa
asita
oosaka e
itte,
hiro wa
tomorrow
ALL
go-TE
TOP
asatte
oosaka kara kaette
kuru.
day.after.tomorrow
ABL
return-TE come
‘Maki will go to Osaka tomorrow, and Hiro will return from Osaka
the day after.’
TOP
However, the nonfinite first conjunct is the only basis for claiming a subordinate relationship in (4). Semantically, the first conjunct does not modify or
complement the second in any way.
Such a discrepancy between syntax and semantics is also found in the
Latin ablative absolute, e.g. (5), as discussed by R. Lakoff (1984:488-89).
(5)
Caesar, acceptis litteris, nuntium mittit.
‘Caesar, the letter having been received, sends a messenger.’
Lakoff considers parataxis and hypotaxis to form a continuum along which
there are four major levels (487-88):
A.
B.
C.
Pure parataxis, or side-by-side sentences, with nothing explicitly present
to indicate any relationship between them; e.g. ‘The baby cried. The
mother picked it up.’
Mixed type, with the ideas of relatedness expressed via coordinating
conjunction; e.g. ‘The baby cried, and the mother picked it up.’ Type B
differs from type A: while B does not explicitly state the nature of the
relationship between the two conjuncts, it does make explicit its existence, whereas type A does not.
Near-hypotaxis, in which one idea, or clause, is subordinated to the
other: not only is the relationship of one idea to the other made explicit,
7 Talmy (1978b) claims that Japanese has no genuine coordinate constructions
whatsoever. While his arguments require further scrutiny, the claim itself is valid in
the sense that there is no connective synonymous or even analogous to the conjunction and, which is the most general device for coordination. Even elements which
have been traditionally categorized as coordination conjunctions, e.g. si ‘and’, are
heavily loaded semantically and pragmatically, and thus subject to various semantic
and/or pragmatic constraints.
10
D.
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
but also the exact semantic nature of that relation-ship — temporal
sequentiality, cause, condition, etc. E.g. ‘The baby cried before the
mother picked it up’; ‘When the baby cried, the mother picked it up.’
The two clauses, or idea-units, are still syntactically autonomous.
Pure hypotaxis, in which the subordinated clause loses its full sentential
identity. Both syntactically and semantically, the relationship between
the two original ideas is one of subordination. E.g. ‘After crying, the
baby was picked up by the mother.’
Lakoff implies that, in general, the closer the encoding strategy to the pure
hypotaxis end, the more explicit the semantic relation between the clauses.8
But languages may prefer some strategies over others. The ablative absolute
of Latin, a language which especially favors subordinate syntax, appears to
her ‘perverse in that it subordinates, but to no semantic end: it provides no
indication ... of exactly what the relationship between the clauses is supposed
to be. This must be supplied by the reader from context. In meaning, the
ablative absolute is equivalent to a coordinating conjunction’ (488). For just
the same reason, some types of Japanese TE-construction are perceived semantically as coordination.
2.3.3.
Coordination-Subordination Continuum
Kuno (1973, §17) proposes that the coordination-subordination dichotomy
should be replaced by a continuum. Having applied several syntactic tests to
multi-clausal sentences in Japanese with six different connective constructions (TE, ren’yoo, toki ‘when’, node ‘because’, to ‘upon V-ing’, and si ‘and’),
he claims that all six show different ‘degrees’ of subordination.9 His observations are summarized in the following. (The first verb is represented as
V1, and the second as V2; similarly, C1 and C2 represent the first and the
second clause, respectively.)
A.
B.
Only with TE, ren’yoo, and toki can V1 be in the scope of sentence-final
interrogative ka.
Only with TE, ren’yoo, and toki can V1 be in the scope of sentence-final
negative na-.
8 Orin Gensler has suggested to me that while the generalization is valid across
categories A to C, the semantic relations in D need not be more explicit than those in
C. Rather, the contrary can be more frequently observed.
9 Prior to Kuno, Minami (1964) had proposed a similar analysis within the frame-
work of traditional Japanese grammar, kokugogaku. For a brief survey of kokugo-gaku analyses of clause linkage, see Shinzato (1981).
Chapter 1: Introduction
C.
D.
E.
11
Only with TE, ren’yoo, and toki can V1 be in the scope of sentence-final
modal yoo to s- ‘be about to’.
Only with TE, ren’yoo, toki, node, and possibly to can an element in C2
be preposed to the left of V1.10
With toki, node, and to, the so-called zero pronoun () in C2 need not
be coreferential with the subject of C1, whereas with TE, ren’yoo, and si,
 must be coreferential with the subject of C1.
(When the subject of C2 is overtly present, Kuno contends, TE, ren’yoo,
and si mark coordination, and thus (E) is irrelevant.)
From observations (A) through (E), Kuno concludes that TE and ren’yoo
are the tightest subordination connectives; yet when they conjoin clauses with
different subjects, they paradoxically signal coordination, which is at the
loosest extreme on his continuum (see Table 1 below).
Kuno’s data, however, do not necessarily support his claim that these
connective constructions form a continuum. They only suggest that there are
more categories than the traditional coordination and subordination. Furthermore, it is highly peculiar that TE and ren’yoo should be used to signal
only the two extremes on the ‘continuum’, i.e. tightest subordination and
(loosest) coordination.
This peculiarity suggests that Kuno’s
one-dimensional continuum along the axis of coordination-subordination is
inadequate to represent the full diversity of TE-constructions.
TABLE 1
Kuno’s Subordination-Coordination Continuum
Subordination
tight

Is V1 in the scope of ka?
Is V1 in the scope of na-?
Is V1 in the scope of yoo to
s-?
Can an element in C2 be
preposed?
Coordination
loose

to
TE,
Ren’yoo
toki
node
TE, si
Ren’yoo
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
No
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes?
No
10 Kuno mentions that when the ren’yoo form denotes two independent actions,
rather than two successive actions, no elements in C2 can be preposed to the left of V1.
12
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Can  have disjoint reference?
2.3.4.
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Seven Parameters
Haiman and Thompson (1984) propose that subordination as a grammatical
category should be abandoned in toto because it does not refer to a single
phenomenon. Subordinate clauses are merely non-main clauses, but the main
clause as a grammatical notion is itself not well defined. They contend that
there are at least seven independent formal properties which are usually
associated with subordinate as opposed to main clauses.
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
F.
G.
Identity between the two clauses in subject, tense, and/or mood, e.g.
‘Leaving her family behind, she fled.’
Reduction of one of the clauses resulting from ellipsis or neutralization
of some categorial opposition, e.g. ‘I recommended submitting the
proposal’ (the opposition of tense in submitting is lost).
Grammatically signaled incorporation of one of the clauses, e.g. relative
clauses.
Intonational linking of the two clauses.
One clause within the scope of the other, cf. ‘What did she run out of the
room hollering?’ vs. *‘What did George cook enchiladas although Sally
can’t eat?’
Absence of tense iconicity between the two clauses, e.g. ‘To buy provisions, they took me into the market.’
Identity of speech act perspective between the two clauses; i.e., in the
case of direct speech, the speaker is presenting two different points of
view, his/her own and that of the person being quoted, while in the case
of indirect speech, only the speaker’s point of view is presented.
They suggest that instead of assuming a coordination-subordination dichotomy, the analyst must determine which parameters are relevant to describing the relationship between the particular conjuncts under investigation
in the particular language.
Let us analyze TE-linkage with respect to these parameters, of which A,
B, D, E, F are relevant. Identity of subject is not obligatory in some
TE-constructions, e.g. (6a), but it is obligatory in others, e.g. (6b).
(6) a.maki wa
TOP
asita
tomorrow
kinoo
oosaka e
itte hiro
yesterday
ALL
go-TE
oosaka kara kaette
kuru.
ABL
return-TE come
wa
TOP
Chapter 1: Introduction
13
‘Maki went to Osaka yesterday, and Hiro will return from Osaka
tomorrow.’
b. renga o
tukatte ie
o
brick
ACC
use-TE
house ACC
‘(I) will build a house using bricks.’
tateru.
build
With regard to tense, because the first conjunct is nonfinite, its semantic tense
might appear to be identical with that of the second. In fact, though, in some
TE-constructions the tenses need not be identical, e.g. (6a), whereas in others
they must be, e.g. (6b). Identity of mood also varies according to the type of
TE-construction, as shown in (7). In (7a), both constituents are clearly within
the scope of the evidential marker soo: in (7c), two readings are possible. In
(7b), however, judgments vary from speaker to speaker.
(7) a.renga o
tukatte ie
o
tateru soo
da.
brick
ACC
use-TE
house ACC build
EVID COP-NPST
‘(S/he) will build a house using bricks, I have heard.’
NOT: ‘(S/he) will use bricks, and I heard that (s/he) will build a house.’
b. maki wa
kinoo
oosaka
e
itte
hiro wa
yesterday
ALL
go-TE
TOP
asita
oosaka kara kaette
kuru
soo
da.
tomorrow
ABL
return-TE come EVID COP-NPST
‘I heard that Maki went to Osaka yesterday, and that Hiro will
return from Osaka tomorrow.’
??‘Maki went to Osaka yesterday, and I heard that Hiro will return
from Osaka tomorrow.’
TOP
c.maki ga
sinde hahaoya wa
hokenkin
o
die-TE mother
TOP
insurance.money ACC
seekyuu suru soo
da.
claim
do
EVID COP-NPST
‘Maki died, and I heard that (her) mother will claim the insurance
money.’
‘I heard that Maki died and that (her) mother will claim the
insurance money.’
NOM
Intonational contour (Parameter D) is also not uniform across the various types of TE-construction. The syntactic and semantic difference between
the following otherwise identical sentences is signaled by the presence
(represented by a comma) or absence of a demarcative low tone around the
onset of /i/ in simatta. Simaw- functions as a main predicate in (8a), but as an
auxiliary in (8b), indicating the speaker’s regret.
14
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(8) a. hen na
hon o
yonde, simatta.
obscene book ACC read-TE put.away-PST
‘(I) read an obscene book and put (it) away.’
b.
hen na
hon o
yonde
simatta.
obscene book ACC read-TE put.away-PST
‘(I)’ve read an obscene book (to my regret).’
As for Parameter E (one clause within the scope of the other), the scope
varies according to the semantic relationship intended between the conjuncts.
(9) a.#dare ga
oosaka e
itte
hiro ga
who NOM
ALL
go-TE
NOM
itta
-n
desu
ka.
went NMLZ COP-NPST Q
‘Who went to Osaka, and Hiro went to Kyoto?’
b. #hiro ga
NOM
oosaka e
ALL
itte
go-TE
ka.
dare
who
ga
kyooto e
ALL
[intended]
kyooto e
NOM
itta
-n
desu
went NMLZ COP-NPST Q
‘Hiro went to Osaka, and who went to Kyoto?’
ALL
[intended]
c. dare ga
kite,
paatii ga
dainasi ni natta
who NOM
come-TE party
NOM
became.ruined
-n
desu
ka.
NMLZ
COP-NPST Q
Lit. ‘Who came, and the party became ruined?’
NOT ‘Who came, and did the party get ruined?’
d.
hiro
ga
NOM
kite,
come-TE
nani ga
what NOM
dainasi ni natta
became.ruined
-n
NMLZ
desu
ka.
COP-NPST Q
Lit. ‘Hiro came, and what got ruined?’
If a CAUSE relation can be inferred between the two clauses, as in (9c, d),
querying a constituent in either clause separately is acceptable. If nothing
more than an ADDITIVE relation can be inferred, however, as in (9a, b), a
constraint compatible to the so-called Coordinate Structure Constraint (Ross
1967) applies,11 and the clauses cannot be queried separately.
11 Charles Fillmore has pointed out that the constraint which prohibits interrogation
Chapter 1: Introduction
15
Finally, tense iconicity between the two conjuncts (Parameter F) may be
absent if the motivation for utilizing TE-linkage is clearly predetermined by
discourse or extralinguistic context. If, for example, the interlocutors are
checking the payments of customers on an alphabetized list, one might hear:12
(10)
abe-san
wa
asita
haratte bandoo-san wa
tomorrow pay-TE
TOP
sensyuu
haratte dan-san wa
raisyuu
haratte
last.week pay-TE
TOP
next.week pay-TE
endoo-san wa
kinoo
haraimasita.
TOP
yesterday
paid(POL)
‘Abe will pay tomorrow, Bandô paid last week, Dan will pay next
week, and Endô paid yesterday.’
TOP
These various parameters should certainly be taken into consideration in
any analysis of TE-linkage. However, testing each parameter independently
of the others yields little overall insight, as demonstrated above.
2.3.5.
Coordination-Subordination-Cosubordination
Foley and Van Valin (1984) and Van Valin (1984) recognize that there are
two primary components in the traditional coordination-subordination distinction. ‘First, in a coordinate relationship each clause in the linkage is
independent of the others in form, so that each can stand on its own as a
complete sentence. In subordination ... only one of the clauses is in a fully
independent form; the other occurs in a form which precludes its occurrence
as a complete sentence ... There is thus a contrast in terms of dependence’
(Van Valin 1984:542). For example, sentences beginning with But can appear in formal writing, e.g. ‘R. Lakoff implies that the closer the encoding
strategy to the pure hypotaxis end, the more explicit the semantic relation
between the clauses. But languages may prefer some strategies over others.’
By contrast, if a because-clause — e.g. ‘Because the first conjunct is
non-finite’ — is uttered in isolation, it is considered to be telegraphic speech.
The second component of the coordination-subordination distinction is
of a member of coordinate conjunctions does not apply to NPs in Japanese; e.g. boku
to dare ‘I and who’ is a well-formed NP. For the semantic and pragmatic nature of the
Coordinate Structure Constraint, see Erteschik-Shir and Lappin (1979) and G. Lakoff
(1986).
12 The wa-marked NPs in (10) are so-called contrastive NPs, which bear properties
distinct from wa-marked topic NPs. See Chapter 2 §2 for further discussion of these
two kinds of NP-wa.
16
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
that ‘in subordination one of the clauses functions as a part of another,
whereas in coordination each clause is complete and distinct from all others.
In other words, subordination involves embedding, while coordination involves the joining of autonomous whole clauses’ (542). Based on these two
parameters, four possibilities emerge.
A.
B.
C.
D.
[dependent,
[dependent,
[dependent,
[dependent,
embedded]
embedded]
embedded]
embedded]
Type A designates coordination, and D subordination. Van Valin (1984) lists
some candidates for type B: parentheticals, direct discourse complements,
and syntactic amalgams (G. Lakoff 1976). Type C is referred to as cosubordination,13 a term originally proposed by Olson (1981) for the analysis of
Barai, a Papuan language. Cosubordination is widespread in the world’s
languages, e.g. Choctaw and Tonkawa (Muskogean: Oklahoma), Jacaltec
(Mayan: Guatemala), and Swahili.
There are two kinds of dependency: operator dependency and distributional dependency. In the former, the clause cannot stand as a complete
sentence because it depends on another clause for operators which are part of
its interpretation, as in the first half of ‘Depending on another for operators,
the clause cannot occur by itself.’ In the latter, the clause cannot stand alone
even though it depends on no other clauses for operators, e.g. the because-clause example above.14
Some TE-constructions are properly categorized as falling under
cosubordination: there is operator dependency, but no embedding. This
coordination-subordination-cosubordination trichotomy and the theory of
Role and Reference Grammar are adopted in the present work to represent
syntactic properties of TE-constructions. Combined with three juncture types,
this trichotomy can accommodate most of the parameters proposed by
Haiman and Thompson. A synopsis of the theory is provided in Chapter 2.
13 This is a somewhat unusual term, suggesting that two or more constituents are
jointly subordinate to another constituent. However, for want of a better term, I will
maintain cosubordination to refer to a dependent yet nonembedded constituent.
14 In the current version of Role and Reference Grammar, e.g. Van Valin (1993), the
term dependent is restricted to operator dependency. It is considered that operators
are not directly relevant to the determination of subordination because the crucial
defining feature of the latter is embedding; the fundamental contrast then is between
embedded and non-embedded constructions, and a dependency contrast is relevant
only to distinguishing between coordination and cosubordination.
Chapter 1: Introduction
3.
17
MEANING OF CONNECTIVES
Most, if not all, linguistic expressions are semantically underspecified, but
potential ambiguities rarely emerge if an expression is embedded in a larger
context. If a word appears in a sentence and the sentence is uttered or written
in discourse, the word and the intrasentential, intersentential, and/or extrasentential context contribute jointly to the final interpretation, eliminating
most semantic ambiguity.15
TE-linkage exhibits an extreme degree of semantic unspecificity, and
probably for this very reason is particularly common in actual usage 16 —
without causing problems in communication. This leads to questions about
how much of the meaning is attributable to the TE-linkage itself, how much to
the properties of the conjuncts, and how much to the interpreter’s extralinguistic knowledge of the described situation. Before proceeding with this
inquiry, let us clarify the notion of meaning to be used in this study.
3.1.
Independent and Dependent Semantic Aspects
Following the methodology of Reichling, Dik (1968:257-58) divides linguistic information into semantic information and grammatical (i.e. syntactic/morphological) information. The former is information relevant to the
linguistic expression as such, and the latter pertains to the internal organization of the expression. All expressions have grammatical information associated with them by virtue of being usable in larger syntagms.
Semantic information is further divided into independent and dependent
semantic aspects. The independent semantic aspects are immediately obtainable from the expression without further linguistic context. By contrast,
the dependent semantic aspects of the expression can be obtained only within
a larger whole of which the expression is a part. For example, speakers of
15 Imai and Suto (1981) refer to this feature of language as juncture of convergence
(i.e. combining words restricts the interpretation), as opposed to juncture of divergence (combining words increases the possibilities of interpretation).
16 On the basis of a corpus of 3,330 multi-predicate sentences sampled from various
types of text, Saeki (1975:81) reports a total of 26 different connectives (1,047 tokens
altogether), of which TE holds the foremost rank. It occurs 512 times, whereas the
second most frequent connective ga occurs only 141 times. According to K. Inoue
(1983:128-30), TE appears most frequently in spontaneous speech (34.5% of all
connectives) and in informal writing (27%). In formal writing such as newspaper
editorials, TE ranks second (17.2%) after ren’yoo linkage (36.9%). The actual occurrence of TE is much more frequent than these numbers suggest because these data
do not include cases in which the second predicate is a so-called auxiliary.
18
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
English know the semantics of table with no further context, whereas they do
need some context, e.g. table_, to identify the semantics of the plural suffix -s;
plurality, as a relational notion, cannot be defined without essential reference
to some noun. Thus table is said to have an independent semantic aspect of its
own, whereas -s has only a dependent one. Dependent semantic aspects are
also called semantic values.17
Henceforth I will use the expression ‘meaning of the connective X’ to
refer to X’s dependent semantic aspects. Connectives have grammatical
information associated with them. They also indicate certain relationships
between the semantic information of one conjunct and that of the other. But
connectives do not carry independent semantic aspects of their own. Even
with such a ‘semantically loaded’ connectives as before, in order to describe
its semantics, it is necessary to take linked clauses into account — e.g., the
referent of the main clause precedes the referent of the before clause.
Viewed in this light, the common claim that TE does not have its own
meaning is justified only if meaning is restricted to independent semantic
aspects, since indeed no semantic description of TE is possible without recourse to the larger constituent of which TE is a part. However, the advocates
of this claim appear to contend that TE lacks even dependent semantic aspects: they assert that the contingent semantic relations associated with
TE-linkage are so diverse that the interpreter only infers the specific sense
intended by the speaker. In order to discuss this issue, it is necessary to clarify
the distinction between what is asserted and what is implicated.
3.2.
Implicature
One of the basic requirements for understanding discourse is recognizing how
each clause coheres with its predecessor. Our linguistic and pragmatic
competence enables us to read in conceivable relation(s) even when two
clauses are simply juxtaposed in parataxis. Thus, certain aspects of interpretation are not part of the conventional force of the uttered sentence, but
rather part of what Grice (1975) has named conversational implicature. For
example, one automatically perceives a CAUSE relation when one hears ‘My
cat died last night. I’m sad’; it therefore seems superfluous to specifically
attribute a CAUSE relation to and in ‘My cat died last night, and I’m sad.’
Another example of such implicature is ‘They had a baby and got mar17 Following Reichling, Dik also proposes the following terminological distinction:
the term content for the independent semantic aspect contained in a phrase, a clause,
or a sentence, and the term meaning only for that contained in a word. However, I do
not consider this distinction necessary, and it has not been adopted in this study.
Chapter 1: Introduction
19
ried’ (Wilson 1975:151). As Horn (1985:146-47) points out, a TEMPORAL
SEQUENCE relation (as in the and-then reading) is present even when these
two clauses are in mere parataxis. Rather than attributing the TEMPORAL
SEQUENCE relation to the meaning of and itself, therefore, researchers (e.g.
Gazdar 1979, Leech 1983, Levinson 1983) appeal to certain auxiliary theories, such as the iconicity between clause order and intended temporal order
(Haiman 1980, 1985) and the Gricean maxim of manner that states ‘Be orderly.’
In the Gricean theory of linguistic pragmatics, the CAUSE relation observed between conjuncts linked by because and the PRECEDENCE relation
observed between conjuncts linked by before are considered instances of
conventional (not conversational) implicature. Conventional implicature
involves the non-truth conditional lexical meaning of some element and is
attached to a particular expression by convention, not by pragmatic principles. For example, the conjunctions and and but are truth-conditionally
equivalent; the ‘additional’ meaning of contrast that but conveys is imparted
by conventional implicature (Grice 1961). As Levinson points out, however,
‘conventional implicature is not a very interesting concept — it is rather an
admission of the failure of truth-conditional semantics to capture all the
conventional content or meaning of natural language words and expressions’
(1983:128). In this study, conventional implicatures will be considered as
falling under the heading of asserted meaning. Implicature will thus be restricted to conversational implicature.
The difference between and-linkage (implicated) and because- or before-linkage (asserted) emerges sharply in the following pairs.
(11) a. One plus one is two, and I’m sad.
b. Because one plus one is two, I’m sad.
(12) a. John eats apples, and six men can fit in the back seat of Ford.
b. John eats apples before six men can fit in the back seat of a
Ford.
If the b-sentences were uttered, the interpreter would at least try to make sense
out of them in such a way that a CAUSE (11b) or a PRECEDENCE (12b) holds
between the conjuncts; the connectives because and before force these interpretations. Success or failure in interpreting anomalous sentences like
(11b, 12b) will depend on one’s deductive abilities.18 In interpreting (11b),
for example, one might link the situations in the following way:
One refers to a person. As in arithmetic, one person and one person are
18 R. Lakoff (1971) argues that this statement also holds for the interpretation of
coordination constructions (including and-linkage).
20
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
two persons. The speaker feels sad because however much people try to
understand each other, they are nevertheless individuals and therefore
cannot unite perfectly.
The interpreter might consider (12b) as describing John dieting so that he will
be thinner and take up less space.
With the a-sentences, on the other hand, the word and does not demand
any particular interpretation. Indeed the most likely interpretation of and here
is simply as a signal that the speaker has something more to say, i.e., intends
to keep the floor. Halliday and Hasan (1976:233), who draw a strict line
between structural and cohesive (semantic) relationships, note:
The ‘and’ relation is felt to be structural and not cohesive, at least by
mature speakers; this is why we feel a little uncomfortable at finding a
sentence in written English beginning with And, and why we tend not to
consider that a child’s composition having and as its dominant sentence
linker can really be said to form a cohesive whole.
They contend that and has a syntactic function, but that it provides little
information about the semantic relation between the conjuncts.
Grice (1975) proposes several diagnostic tests for conversational implicature, of which the so-called cancellability test is the most prominent.19
Conversational implicatures can be cancelled without yielding contradiction,
as with and in (13a). By contrast, if something is asserted, denying (part of) it
will result in contradiction, as with before in (13b).
(13) a. They had a baby and got married, but not necessarily in that
order.
b. #They had a baby before they got married, but not necessarily in
that order.
TE is in this respect similar to and. The CAUSE relation associated with
a TE-construction is cancellable and hence can be taken as a conversational
19 Conversational implicatures are characterized as calculable, cancellable, nonde-
tachable, nonconventional, and indeterminate (Grice 1975). However, Sadock
claims that ‘there are no sufficient tests for conversational implicature and no group
of tests that together are sufficient’ (1978:295). He argues that nondetachability fails
to be a necessary feature, nonconventionality is completely circular, and indeterminacy is not unique to conversational implicatures (cf. demonstratives).
‘[C]alculability is trivially necessary since nearly anything can be “worked out” with
the aid of the Cooperative Principle’ (295). And cancellability, although necessary,
fails to be sufficient ‘for recognizing conversational implicature because, in the very
important case of grammatical ambiguity, any one sense is obviously cancellable’
(296).
Chapter 1: Introduction
21
implicature.
(14)
kaze o
hiite
atama ga
itai.
atama ga
cold ACC catch-TE head
NOM ache
head
NOM
itai
no
wa
itumo no
koto dakedo.
ache NMLZ TOP always GEN thing though
‘(I) caught a cold, and (my) head aches. I always have a headache,
though.’
If only the first sentence were supplied, it would naturally be implicated that
the cold is a cause of the speaker’s headache. Here, however, this implicature
is cancelled by the second sentence, indicating that the speaker always has a
headache anyway. In a typical scenario the speaker, after uttering the first
sentence, realizes the potential implicature and cancels it explicitly.
The TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation is likewise cancellable, and hence
it, too, can be regarded as a conversational implicature.
(15)
maki wa
TOP
oosaka e
ALL
itte
hiro wa oosaka kara
go-TE
TOP
ABL
ga
kaette
kuru
no
NOM
return-TE come NMLZ
kaette
kuru. hiro
return-TE come
ga
saki dakedo.
NOM first
though
‘Maki will go to Osaka, and Hiro will come back from Osaka.
Hiro’s return comes first, though.’
To recapitulate, in both and- and TE-linkage, the perceived semantic
relation would be present even if the linked constituents were in parataxis,
and the semantic relation would not be perceived unless it were already
present in the parataxis of the conjuncts without and or TE. Accordingly,
many researchers have claimed that TE, like and, does not have a meaning of
its own, and that all semantic relations that the hearer perceives are implicated
by the conjuncts themselves and the context. Let us call this claim the implicature-only reductionist analysis.
This implicature-only reductionist analysis is challenged, however, by
the fact that not all semantic relations potentially implicated by parataxis can
be expressed by TE-linkage — i.e., TE is not absolutely transparent.20 Some
conceivable relations are in fact filtered out when constituents are linked by
TE, and TE-linkage has many arbitrary (and idiomatic) constraints, both on
possible semantic relations and on the semantic nature of the conjuncts, which
20 A similar observation has been made by van Dijk (1977) regarding and in English.
22
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
cannot be attributed to any pragmatic principles. In other words, TE-linkage
restricts the universe of possible semantic relations implicated by the conjuncts. The following section exemplifies such constraints imposed by
TE-linkage.
3.3.
Constraints on TE-Linkage
3.3.1.
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE Relation and TE-Linkage
It is frequently claimed in the literature that one of the major uses of
TE-linkage is to express TEMPORAL SEQUENCE or CONSECUTIVENESS
(Matsuo 1936, NLRI 1951, Negishi 1970, Kuno 1973, T. Takahashi 1975,
Morita 1980, Endô 1982, Konoshima 1983, Narita 1983, R. Hamada 1985,
Matsuda 1985). In this section, it is argued to the contrary that TEMPORAL
SEQUENCE per se cannot be expressed by TE-linkage.
Given appropriate pairs of clauses, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE can always
be implicated when two clauses are in parataxis, as in (16).
(16)
watasi wa
ie
o
deta. ame
I
TOP
house ACC left
rain
‘I left home. It began raining.’
ga
NOM
hutte kita.
began.falling
The speaker’s leaving home and the onset of rain is a possible sequence of
events, and yet (16´) is unacceptable.
(16´) #watasi wa ie
o
dete
ame ga
hutte kita.
I
TOP house
ACC
leave-TE rain NOM began.falling
‘I left home, and it began raining.’
[intended] (Endô 1982)
Significantly, there would be no unnaturalness here if the connective to (with
a necessary alteration to the inflection of the preceding predicate) were used
instead of TE; the sentence would now permit a TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
interpretations. The anomaly of (16´) will be discussed in detail in Chapter 6.
For the present, suffice it to say that a mere incidental TEMPORAL SEQUENCE cannot be expressed by TE-linkage.
3.3.2.
ADDITIVE Relation and TE-Linkage
Some ADDITIVE relations that are inferable from constituents in parataxis
cannot be expressed by TE-linkage. In (17), TE-linkage cannot replace
ren’yoo-linkage, which is also compatible with English and-linkage.
Chapter 1: Introduction
23
(17)
nihon-rettoo
ni
hazimete
dokuzi no
bunka
Japanese.islands LOC for.the.first.time own
GEN
culture
o
umidasita zyoomon-zin wa
kariudo de
ACC
created
Jomon.people TOP hunter COP
ari
(#atte), gyohu
datta.
[Hakubutsukan]
be(ren’yoo) (be-TE) fisherman were
‘The Japanese of the Jomon period [8000 to 200 B.C.], who
created their own culture for the first time on the Japanese islands,
were hunters and fishermen.’
Here, if TE-linkage is utilized, native speakers expect the second constituent
to be a negative clause, as in (17´). This is a peculiar constraint on TE-linkage
applying when ar- ‘be’ is the first predicate.
(17´) nihon-rettoo
ni
hazimete
dokuzi no
bunka
Japanese.islands LOC for.the.first.time own
GEN
culture
o
umidasita zyoomon-zin wa
kariudo de
atte,
ACC
created
Jomon.people TOP hunter
COP
be-TE
gyohu
de
wa
nakatta.
fisherman COP TOP NEG-PST
‘The Japanese of the Jomon period ... were hunters but not
fishermen.’
3.3.3.
CAUSE Relation and TE-Linkage
Another major semantic relation attributable to TE-linkage is CAUSE.
Sweetser (1990) argues that some ambiguities of conjunctions are not due to
polysemy on the part of the lexical items, but rather to ambiguity among the
content (real-world), epistemic, and speech act domains in which they apply,
as illustrated in (18).
(18) a.Since John wasn’t there, we decided to leave a note for him.
(His absence caused our decision in the real world.)
b. Since John isn’t here, he has (evidently) gone home.
(The knowledge of his absence causes my conclusion that he has
gone home.)
c.Since {we’re on the subject/you’re so smart}, when was George
Washington born?
(I ask you because we’re on the subject, or because you’re so
smart — the fact that we’re on the subject, for example, enables
my act of asking the question.)
24
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
When CAUSE applies in the epistemic domain, the event sequence may
be distinct from the real-world temporal sequence. For example, one may
say, ‘My daughter will begin college soon, and I had to quit the gym (to save
money for tuition).’ Japanese can express these clauses in the same order by
using the conjunction node (roughly ‘since/because’), as shown in (19).
(19) musume ga
moo-sugu gakkoo ni
hairu
node
daughter NOM soon
school LOC enter-NPST because
zimu o
yamenakereba naranakatta.
gym ACC had.to.quit
‘Because my daughter will begin school soon, I had to quit the
gym.’
This sequence can also be implicated by parataxis; it cannot, however, be
expressed by TE-linkage.
(19´) #musume ga
moo-sugu gakkoo ni
haitte
daughter NOM soon
school LOC enter-TE
zimu o
yamenakereba naranakatta.
gym ACC had.to.quit
One may still attempt to argue that the basic function of TE-linkage is to
express TEMPORAL SEQUENCE, and that CAUSE is parasitic on this. Sentence (19´) would then be anomalous because (i) morphologically TE does not
permit the preceding verb to be tensed, (ii) TE-linkage expresses only that the
referent of the first conjunct temporally precedes that of the second, (iii) the
tense of the second clause in (19´) is in the past, and thus (iv) the event referred to by the first conjunct must itself have occurred in the past — which is,
however, not the case. In other words, CAUSE relations can be expressed by
TE-linkage only when they are in accordance with TEMPORAL SEQUENCE.
However, this claim fails to account for the fact that TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
per se cannot be expressed by TE-linkage, as demonstrated earlier.
Furthermore, certain CAUSE relations are also filtered out by TE-linkage
even when the two clauses do maintain an iconic temporal order. In (20a), for
example, the first sentence is naturally interpreted as the CAUSE of the
speaker’s happy feeling. However, linking these two sentences by TE will
result in anomaly, as shown in (20b).
(20) a. kutu o
katta. uresii.
shoe ACC bought am.happy
‘(I) bought shoes. I am happy.’
b. #kutu o
katte
uresii.
shoe ACC buy-TE am.happy
‘I bought shoes, and (so) I’m happy.’
[intended]
Chapter 1: Introduction
25
c. kutu o
katte
uresikatta.
shoe ACC buy-TE was.happy
‘I bought shoes, and (so) I was happy.’
The reason for this pattern of anomaly lies in the interaction between the
construction and modality. Modality is defined as the speaker’s mental attitude toward the proposition or the speech act at the time of utterance,
conceived as the speaker’s instantaneous present (Nakau 1979, 1992).
Verbals in Japanese like uresi- ‘be happy’ in (20), which denote human
feelings or mental activity, are called psych-predicates21 and are considered
to be modality expressions when occurring in the nonpast tense. Such
psych-predicates are subject to constraints on grammatical tense when occurring in TE-linkage: as shown in (20), a CAUSE relation can be expressed
by TE-linkage when the predicate is in the past tense (20c), but not when it is
in the nonpast (20b). This constraint on the interaction between CAUSE and
modality is unique to TE-linkage, and thus must be stated in its description.
These facts indicate that if a theory claims a certain semantic relation to
be derived by implicature, it must then employ some filtering mechanism to
eliminate those subtypes of the relation which do not persist through
TE-linkage. But such filtering will be impossible unless the theory has attributed potential semantic relations to TE-linkage in the first place, because
the constraints need to apply only to instances where the linkage has a particular semantic value — a non-incidental course of events in the case of
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE, or temporal iconicity in the case of CAUSE.
At least as far as descriptions of connectives are concerned, the reductionism of the implicature-only analysis — with its attribution of as many
semantic relations as possible to pragmatics — does not seem tenable. It is,
therefore, more expedient to attribute the semantic relations which are
compatible with TE-linkage to the TE-linkage itself. In the following section,
an experimental study supporting this contention is introduced.
21 In Japanese, the direct representation of subjective experiences (represented con-
sciousness) other than the speaker’s own yields what Banfield (1982) refers to as an
unspeakable sentence, i.e., one which cannot naturally occur in spoken language.
Kuroda (1973) calls the style where such psych-predicates appear only with
first-person subjects the reportive style. In reportive style, only the person himself/herself is entitled to express his/her own psychological state; in the nonreportive
style, by contrast, a third-person subject is permitted for such predicates. See also
Benveniste (1966) and Aoki (1986) regarding this phenomenon.
26
3.4.
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Imai and Suto’s Experiment
Imai and Suto (1981) consider the following five hypotheses regarding the
meaning of connective constructions in Japanese.
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
The connective in question has only syntactic functions, but no semantic
value.22 Consequently, if there is more than one such connective and
their syntactic properties are the same, they are interchangeable in all
sentences where one may be appropriately used.
The connective in question has a single semantic value, and the conjuncts intrinsically hold a single semantic relation to each other. The
connective can be appropriately used only if its semantic value and the
semantic relation between the conjuncts match. Therefore, use of the
connective is redundant.
The connective in question has a single semantic value, and there are
multiple possibilities for the semantic relation between the conjuncts.
The connective can be appropriately used only if one of the semantic
relations between the conjuncts matches the semantic value of the
connective. In such a case, the connective specifies the semantic relation between the conjuncts.
The connective in question has multiple semantic values, and the conjuncts can only hold a single semantic relation. The connective can be
appropriately used only if the semantic relation between the conjuncts
matches one of the semantic values of the connective.
The connective has multiple semantic values, and there are multiple
possibilities for the semantic relation between the conjuncts. The
connective can be appropriately used only if one of its semantic values
and one of the potential semantic relations between the conjuncts match.
To test these hypotheses, Imai and Suto conducted an experiment using
six Japanese connectives — node, kara, nara, ba, to, and TE. They constructed several sets of words, each consisting of two nominative NPs and two
intransitive verbs in the lexical relationship of hyponymy (cf. Cruse 1986),
e.g. mootaa ‘motor’ (hyponym) and kikai ‘machine’ (super-ordinate), and
mawar- ‘spin’ (hyponym) and ugok- ‘move’ (super-ordinate). Combining
these words, they made clauses like kikai ga ugoku ‘the machine runs’ and
mootaa ga mawaru ‘the motor spins’. Next, they linked two clauses built
from a single set with one of the connectives, e.g. kikai ga mawaru node
mootaa ga ugoku ‘Because the machine spins, the motor moves’. By adding
22 Imai and Suto use the term setuzoku kinoo ‘connective function’, which is equiv-
alent in this context to Reichling-Dik’s term semantic value, i.e. dependent semantic
aspect. I have continued to use the latter term to represent their ideas.
Chapter 1: Introduction
27
the negative suffix -na- and the perfective suffix -ta, they then constructed
nine variations for each pair of clauses, as shown in Table 2, where C1 and C2
refer to the first and the second clause, respectively.
These stimuli were presented to native speakers of Japanese, who
judged the naturalness of the connective in each sentence on a five-point
scale. By applying the statistical method known as the Eckart-Young analysis, they obtained the eigenvalue and eigenvector of each connective. The
results show the overall differences among the stimuli in a two-dimensional
vector space, schematically represented in Figure 1.
Figure 1 shows that node, kara, and TE appear above the abscissa, and
nara, ba, and to appear below it. On the other hand, node, kara, nara, and ba
appear to the left of the ordinate, and to and TE to the right of it. This
two-dimensional scattering indicates that the naturalness judgments were
made according to at least two parameters, whatever they may be — an indication that the connectives have multiple semantic values. Imai and Suto
interpret the results in such a way that TE forms a group with to with respect to
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE, and with node and kara with respect to the CAUSE
and CONDITIONAL relations. The most distant connective from TE was nara,
which has the value opposite to TE with respect to both TEMPORAL SEQUENCE and the CAUSE/CONDITIONAL relation.
The results of the experiment are directly relevant to evaluating hypotheses B and D. If a pair of conjuncts has only one intrinsic semantic relation, as hypotheses B and D claim, there are three possibilities. First, if the
intrinsic semantic relation matches the characteristics of TE, then TE should
be rated very natural, but nara should be rated unnatural. Second, if the
intrinsic relation matches the characteristics of nara, nara but not TE should
be rated very natural. Finally, if neither TEMPORAL SEQUENCE nor the
CAUSE/CONDITIONAL relation is relevant to the intrinsic semantic relation
obtaining between the conjuncts, then both should be rated unnatural. In any
case, if hypothesis B or D is valid, then it should be impossible for both TE and
nara to receive a high rating on a scale of intuitive naturalness. However, in
the experiment both connectives did in fact receive high ratings with type 1
stimuli (see Table 2), i.e. when both C1 and C2 were affirmative and in the
nonpast tense: TE received 4.15 and nara 4.14 on a five point scale.
Therefore, Imai and Suto concluded that conjuncts in general must have
multiple possibilities of
TABLE 2
Stimuli of Imai and Suto’s Experiment
C1
-na
1
2
X
C2
-ta
-na
Examples
-ta
kikai ga mawaru node mootaa ga ugoku.
kikai ga mawaranai node mootaa ga ugoku.
28
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
kikai ga mawaru node mootaa ga ugokanai.
kikai ga mawatta node mootaa ga ugoku.
kikai ga mawaru node mootaa ga ugoita.
kikai ga mawaranakatta node mootaa ga ugoku.
kikai ga mawaru node mootaa ga ugokanakatta.
kikai ga mawaranai node mootaa ga ugoita.
kikai ga mawatta node mootaa ga ugokanai.
node kara
TE
ba
to
nara
FIGURE 1: Results of the Eckart-Young Analysis
semantic relation, possibilities which may narrow down when a connective is
inserted.
Based on these results, then, Imai and Suto claim that hypothesis E is the
most plausible: the connectives have multiple semantic values, and pairs of
conjuncts have multiple possibilities of semantic relation. A connective can
be appropriately used only if one of its semantic values matches one of the
potential semantic relations between the conjuncts.23
If this is a valid conclusion, the fact that the semantic relation is not
determined solely by TE does not dictate that TE is meaningless or redundant.
Rather, the connective and the meaning of the conjuncts jointly determine
some semantic relation(s). Attributing the semantic relation(s) to the conjuncts alone would only partially account for how the hearer decodes uttered
sentences. TE-linkage permits some interpretations while rejecting others.
23 One could argue that some connectives have a single semantic value, whereas
others have multiple semantic values, and thus the results do not necessarily support
hypothesis E, which is a statement about connectives in general. However, as far as
the analysis of TE-linkage is concerned, Imai and Suto’s claim does seem to be valid
because, as illustrated in previous sections, it is impossible to attribute a single semantic value to TE-linkage.
Chapter 1: Introduction
4.
29
DECODING AND ENCODING IDIOMS
As has been indicated, although all semantic relations compatible with
TE-linkage can be implicated by biclausal parataxis, not all semantic relations
implicated by parataxis can be implicated by TE-linkage. It is therefore
proposed that the set of all semantic relations which can be expressed by
TE-linkage must be so stated explicitly. Both the connective and the conjuncts encompass multiple semantic relations, and the sentence is acceptable
only when these relations match. Imai and Suto’s study has been presented as
one piece of evidence in support of this claim. In this section, the issue will be
considered from another perspective — hearer-based vs. speaker-based description.
Let us consider what Fillmore, Kay, and O’Connor (1988), following
Makkai (1972), refer to as the distinction between idioms of decoding and
idioms of encoding. The term idiom is used to refer generally to a lexically
filled idiom, e.g. ‘kick the bucket,’ ‘spill the beans’ or ‘pull a fast one.’
However, idioms can be only partially filled, i.e. involve a variable — e.g.
‘hold one’s breath,’ ‘go halves with someone in something.’ At the extreme
of this underspecification are purely formal idioms, e.g. the [NP VP] structural
pattern observed in ‘Him be a doctor?’ (Akmajian 1984). Formal idioms (or
grammatical constructions) are syntactic patterns which are used for semantic
and/or pragmatic purposes not predictable from general grammatical rules
alone, and thus they must be learned separately.
Formal idioms are further divided into decoding idioms and encoding
idioms — those which are necessary for decoding and encoding, respectively.
A decoding idiom is an expression that the language user might or might not
understand without prior experience, but that could not be understood with
complete confidence if it had not been learned separately — e.g. ‘The more
carefully you do your work, the easier it will get’ or ‘Him be a doctor?’ With
an encoding idiom, on the other hand, the point is the speaker’s active
command of the idiom, as manifest in his/her ability to use it. The language
user would not know whether or not an encoding
Encoding
Idioms
Decoding
Idioms
FIGURE 2: Relationship between Encoding and Decoding Idioms
idiom exists as a conventional way of saying what it says unless s/he had
learned it separately.
30
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
To appropriately utter a certain expression — in particular, to correctly
use an encoding idiom — one must know all its syntactic, semantic, and
pragmatic characteristics; but to interpret (decode) the expression one can
make do with less. All decoding idioms are therefore encoding idioms, but
not vice versa (see Figure 2 above).
‘It’s time you brushed your teeth’ and ‘That’s not big enough of a box,’
for example, are encoding idioms but not decoding idioms. Idiomatic expressions like these are quite decodable through the use of analogy or by
appeal to extralinguistic cognitive abilities; but the user could never use them
correctly without having learned the expression separately.
The fact that not all potentially implicated semantic relations are sanctioned by TE-linkage indicates that while one may accurately understand a
semantic relation solely from the meaning of the conjuncts, one cannot
transparently use TE correctly because of its various constraints. Therefore,
while the semantic relations compatible with TE-linkage need not be stated
as such for decoding, this information is indispensable for encoding. Fillmore notes: ‘It is important to distinguish the decoding, or hearer’s point of
view from the encoding, or speaker’s point of view. Applying these two
perspectives in the case of compositionality, we can talk about semantic
transparency in the decoding case, and semantic productivity in the encoding
case’ (1979:67).
The reductionism of attributing all semantic relations to pragmatic
principles in the description of TE-linkage appears to be what Fillmore (63)
calls a theory of the language-understanding abilities of the idealized innocent speaker/hearer. He points out that in addition to the ideal speaker that
knows its language perfectly (Chomsky 1965:3), there is a second idealization — the idealization of innocence — in most traditions of semantics. This
idealized innocent language user knows ‘the morphemes of its language and
their meanings, it recognizes the grammatical structures and processes in
which these morphemes take part, and it knows the semantic import of each of
these. As a decoder, or hearer, the innocent language user calculates the
meaning of each sentence from what it knows about the sentence’s parts and
their organization ... The innocent speaker/hearer is in principle capable of
saying anything sayable’ (Fillmore, op. cit., 64).
However, the innocent speaker/hearer does not know about anything
that falls outside a purely compositional semantics. If we teach certain
pragmatic principles to this language user, it can interpret all TE-linked
sentences — but still cannot use TE correctly. It will, for example, wrongly
conjoin the Japanese equivalents of ‘I sat down’ and ‘The door opened’ with
TE to indicate the sequence of the two situations, thinking that because of the
congruence between clause order and intended sequence of situations the
sentence has indeed been appropriately uttered.
Chapter 1: Introduction
5.
31
GRAMMATICAL CONSTRUCTIONS
The question to be asked, then, is where in the description of language such
idiosyncratic constraints should be stated. As many researchers have pointed
out, the constraints are not properties of TE itself. Nor are they properties of
the syntactic structures in which TE appears, because the constraints emerge
only when a TE-construction expresses a certain semantic relation. Such a
pairing can be stated through the notion of grammatical construction.
Fillmore (1986b:3) notes, ‘[Construction Grammar] aims at describing the
grammar of a language directly in terms of a collection of grammatical constructions each of which represents a pairing of a syntactic pattern with a
meaning structure’ (emphasis in original). This notion of grammatical construction, similar to that found in traditional and pedagogical grammars, is
indispensable for explaining the subtle constraints on TE-linkage.
If we represent one of the syntactic subtypes of TE-linkage — say, the
subtype wherein two clauses have distinct subjects — as [SYN-TE1], and one
of the semantic relations that TE-linkage can denote as [SEM-TE1], then the
grammatical construction [SYN-TE1, SEM-TE1] will be the appropriate descriptive unit with which to associate the constraints on that particular pairing.
For example, the obligatory iconicity between clause order and intended
temporal order is a constraint specifically on the grammatical construction
[SYN-TE1, CAUSE]. This iconicity constraint holds for neither SYN-TE1 nor
CAUSE in isolation, for the constraint does not apply to [ SYN-TE1, ADDITIVE] or to [SYN-NODE, CAUSE].
To take another example, when the subjects of the conjuncts are identical (SYN-TE2) and the second clause contains a psych-predicate, the
grammatical construction [SYN-TE2, CAUSE] is subject to an idiomatic
constraint, as demonstrated in the following set of examples.
(21) a.#kutu o
katte
uresii.
shoe ACC buy-TE am.happy
‘I bought shoes, and (so) I’m happy.’
b.
[intended]
siken ni
ukatte
uresii.
examDAT pass-TE am.happy
‘I passed the exam, and (so) I’m happy.’
c. zyoon ga
kite
uresii.
Joan
NOM
come-TE am.happy
‘Joan came, and (so) I’m happy.’
We have remarked that tense plays a role in the constraint; but other
factors do as well. Though TE-linkage cannot express a CAUSE relation in
32
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(21a), it can do so if the subject of the first clause is not agentive, as shown in
(21b). Note too that coreference of the two subjects is critical: (21c), with
different subjects (i.e. SYN-TE1), is perfectly good. To sum up, when the
subject is shared by both clauses (i.e. SYN-TE2), CAUSE relations cannot be
expressed if (i) the subject bears the thematic relation of agent in the first
clause, and (ii) the second clause is headed by a psych-predicate which is
construed as a modality expression (and is thus in the nonpast tense). This
restriction is to be associated with [SYN-TE2, CAUSE] in the grammatical
description of TE-linkage.
6.
SUMMARY
TE-linkage exhibits characteristics of both coordination and subordination.
The first conjunct, containing a nonfinite predicate, cannot appear independently — which signals its subordination-status. However, in some types
of TE-linkage, there is no evidence for embeddedness of the first conjunct,
and the first conjunct does not semantically modify the second in any sense.
In order to describe the diverse types of TE-linkage, therefore, the three-way
distinction, coordination-subordination-cosubordination, is more appropriate. Chapters 3 to 6 demonstrate that all three types are observed in
TE-linkage.
In almost all cases, the hearer can infer the intended semantic relation
from the meaning of the conjuncts; nevertheless, the grammar must state the
set of all such relations as part of the meaning of TE-linkage, for two reasons.
First, conjuncts typically hold multiple possibilities of semantic relation.
These possibilities are narrowed down, and possibly singled out, when they
appear in a TE-construction, and even analysts who consider such semantic
relations to be implicatures will find it necessary to state which particular
implicature is borne out in the TE-linkage. Second, while one may accurately
interpret sentences without knowing the set of semantic values of TE-linkage,
one still could not use TE correctly because of its idiosyncratic constraints.
The implicature-only reductionist analysis, as usually conceived, imagines
that the whole problem can be dealt with somehow through the agency of
pragmatic implicature; but when one seeks to articulate this ‘somehow’, there
is no way to avoid an explicit statement of TE-compatible semantic relations.
In Chapters 3 to 6, it will be demonstrated that, given relevant syntactic
and semantic information about the conjuncts, the semantic relation of any
particular occurrence of TE-linkage is idiomatic and fairly restricted — which
is not surprising, given that TE is the most frequently occurring connective
and that it functions without causing communicative difficulties.
CHAPTER 2
BASIC CONCEPTS IN ROLE AND
REFERENCE GRAMMAR OF JAPANESE
As discussed in Chapter 1, the connective TE participates in a wide range of
constructions. The provision of a comprehensive and principled account of
all TE-constructions thus poses a challenge for syntactic theories. The theoretical framework adopted in this book to characterize the syntactic properties of TE-linkage is that of Role and Reference Grammar (henceforth
RRG), a monostratal, functional theory of grammar.1 This chapter introduces
the fundamental concepts and mechanisms of RRG.
Regarding intraclausal syntax, it is widely accepted by many theories
that the major constituent break falls between the subject and the VP. RRG
takes a very different approach to this issue — which is the topic of Sections 1
and 2. The central concepts in RRG for representing clause linkage are explained in Section 3 (operators) and Section 4 (juncture and nexus). As for
multiclausal constructions, most syntactic theories employ the traditional
coordination-subordination dichotomy to characterize complex sentences.
This dichotomy, however, is inadequate for analyses of TE-linkage, as discussed in Chapter 1 §2.3. The more adequate trichotomy of coordination-subordination-cosubordination is restated in Section 4 of this chapter.
Section 5 illustrates various linkage types, drawing its examples from both
English and Japanese. RRG relies heavily on the lexical representation of
verbals in its syntactic analysis; Section 6 explains the Vendler-Dowty verb
classes and thematic relations.
1 According to Nichols (1984:97), ‘Functionalists maintain that the communicative
situation motivates, constrains, explains, or otherwise determines grammatical
structure, and that a structural or formal approach is not merely limited to an artificially restricted data base, but is inadequate even as a structural account. Functional
grammar, then, differs from formal and structural grammar in that it purports not to
model but to explain; and the explanation is grounded in the communicative situation.’
34
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
1.
THE LAYERED STRUCTURE OF THE CLAUSE
In RRG each clause is considered to have a layered structure. The innermost
layer of the clause is called the nucleus, which contains the predicate(s). The
next layer is the core, which contains the nucleus and the arguments of the
predicate(s). The arguments are lexical or phrasal dependents of the predicate, i.e., the predicate governs the number of arguments, their surface forms,
and their grammatical and semantic functions. Adjacent to the core is the
periphery, which subsumes non-arguments of the predicate, e.g. outer locative and temporal phrases.2 Each clause consists of at least one (and sometimes more than one) core, with or without periphery. Because its concepts
are defined semantically and/or functionally, the layered structure is considered to be intrinsically universal and independent of the syntactic characteristics of the particular language under investigation (e.g.
configurational-nonconfigurational, or head marking-dependent marking).
RRG posits two additional elements in the layered structure. The precore slot (PCS), which is clause-internal but core-external, accommodates
focused elements, e.g. what in ‘What are you reading?’ Or the exhaustive-listing NP-ga in Japanese (Van Valin 1987). 3 The left detached
2 The distinction between arguments (complements), especially optional arguments,
and non-arguments (adjuncts) varies from theory to theory. Because all syntactic
theories inevitably refer to this distinction, various diagnostic tests have been proposed and tried: back-formation (Steinitz 1969, Helbig and Schenkel 1973), extractability (Brinker 1972), elimination (Helbig and Schenkel 1973), substitution
(Brinker 1972, Andersen 1973a), passivizability (Emons 1974), ‘do-so’ test (Lakoff
and Ross 1976, Somers 1984), addability (Vater 1978), queriability (Herbst 1982),
referability (Kameyama 1985), and question pull (Hasegawa 1988). However, none
of these has provided a theory-neutral basis for the distinction. Some researchers (e.g.
Vater 1978) have given up the distinction, and some others (e.g. Somers 1984) have
proposed finer-grained distinctions, while still others (e.g. Günther 1978) claim that
the dichotomy is intuitively clear in most cases, and thus the lack of clear discovery
procedures does not justify the abandonment of the distinction. Notwithstanding the
theoretical difficulties, recognizing the dependent elements is part of understanding
the predicate (Fillmore 1986a, Pollard and Sag 1987), and the distinction is psychologically real in most cases (Hasegawa 1988). In RRG, the arguments, which
appear in the core, are determined according to the Logical Structure and lexical
idiosyncrasies of the predicate. See Chapter 2 §6 for further discussion.
3 Kuroda (1965) observes that ga is attached to the subject of an adjectival or copu-
lative sentence when a characterizational judgment is involved. In a characterizational judgment, the speaker characterizes some entity in terms of the
property
expressed by the adjectival or copulative phrase, e.g. zyoon ga akarui ‘Joan is
cheerful’ and zyoon ga gakusee da ‘Joan is a student’. Consequently, a sentence
having this ga implies that this entity and only this entity in the current universe of
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
LDP
35
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
PCS
CORE
PERIPH
ARG NUC ARG
ADV
NP
NP
PRED
NP
N
N
V
N
PP
Yes te rd ay , w h at d id J o h n sh o w M ar y i n t h e l ib ra ry ?
FIGURE 1: Layered Structure in RRG
position (LDP), which is sentence-internal but clause-external, accommodates adverbials and topical entities, e.g. wa-marked topic constituents in
Japanese. By positing these two slots, RRG makes it possible to represent the
syntactic reflexes of the so-called theme-rheme distinction (Functional
Sentence Perspective), originally proposed by the Prague School linguist
Mathesius. Figure 1 illustrates the layered structure in RRG.
2.
FOCUS STRUCTURES
RRG does not posit a unit corresponding to the VP in other syntactic theories.
The so-called subject-object asymmetry (cf. Huang 1984, Saito 1985) is
accounted for in terms of the information structure. Lambrecht (1986, 1987,
1988), who considers topic and focus as the primary information statuses,
defines topic as the entity that the proposition is about. The topic referent is
part of the sentence’s pragmatic presupposition and is active or accessible in
the discourse. The focus is the non-presupposed part of the utterance.4
Lambrecht identifies three types of focus structure, with the fundamental contrast between narrow and broad focus. In narrow focus, the focus
domain is a single constituent. Narrow focus subsumes the notion of exdiscourse has such a property. Kuno (1970) calls this function of ga ‘exhaustive
listing’. Note that the exhaustive-listing function is not restricted to subjects but can
also appear with locative or possessive NPs.
4 Erteschik-Shir and Lappin (1979) explain the notion of focus in terms of domi-
nance. They claim that a certain constituent of a sentence is dominant, and that the
speaker intends to direct the hearer’s attention to the intension of that constituent.
36
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
haustive listing. In broad focus, on the other hand, the focus domain extends
over more than one constituent. There are in turn two types of broad focus:
predicate focus and sentence focus. Lambrecht defines predicate focus as
‘unmarked focus structure found in sentence constructions in which the
subject is the topic, ... in which the predicate expresses an assertion about this
topic. The focus domain is the predicate (or part of it). The object NP is the
unmarked focus constituent’ (1988:6). This predicate focus structure corresponds to the traditional notion of topic-comment structure. Sentence
focus, which often corresponds to traditional presentational constructions,
does not have a topical subject: the focus domain is the entire sentence. In
predicate focus structure the subject is the topic, but in sentence focus
structure there is no topic-comment partitioning.
Underlying this predicate focus-sentence focus distinction is the notion
of thetic/categorical judgment, originally proposed by Franz Brentano and
introduced to linguistic circles by Kuroda (1972). 5 Categorical judgments
consist of two separate acts: the act of recognizing that which is to be made
the subject, and the act of affirming or denying what is expressed by the
predicate about the subject. Thetic judgments, on the other hand, are logically unstructured, merely expressing one’s recognition or rejection of the
material of judgment. Kuroda proposes that ga functions as indicator of a
thetic judgment, and wa of a categorical judgment.6
Generally, the subject in Japanese is marked by ga (the nominative case
particle) when it is first introduced into discourse. Subsequently, it is anaphorically referred to either by so-called zero anaphora, by a pronoun, or by
repetition of (some part of) the NP. When a pronoun or an NP is used, it is
then marked by wa (the so-called topic particle). Anaphoric pronouns cannot
be marked by ga in a predicate focus construction. On the other hand, the use
5 For details of the theory, see Kuroda (1972), Lambrecht (1986, 1987), and Sasse
(1987).
6 In his recent work, Kuroda (1990:5) argues that accounts based on Functional
Sentence Perspective (e.g. the old vs. new information account) are unsatisfactory.
Instead, he contends that wa is associated with asserting, and ga with affirming.
‘[A]sserting ... is essentially a positive act taken by a cognitive agent in which s/he
expresses his/her act of committing him/herself to the truth of a proposition, a positive
act to create or register a cognitive reality in the conceptualized form of a proposition.
In contrast, affirming ... is an act of stating a proposition to which the speaker has
already committed him/herself (and s/he assumes that the hearer has, too)’. I agree
with Kuroda that the ga-wa distinction cannot be attributable solely to old vs. new
information. As he points out, to call wa a topic marker is misleading because the
term implies that a discourse-based account is presupposed. I maintain the use of this
well-established term throughout this book, however.
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
37
of ga is appropriate when it functions as a marker of narrow focus, i.e. exhaustive listing, indicated by small capitals in the following examples. In
spoken English, such focused elements bear prosodic prominence; in spoken
Japanese, the particle ga itself, not the entire NP, bears a high tone, and/or the
NP is followed by a pause.
(1) Predicate Focus
a. kare {wa/#ga} sinda.
he
TOP/NOM died
‘He died.’
b.
watasi {wa/#ga} tegami o
I
TOP/NOM letter
ACC
‘I wrote {the/a} letter.’
kaita.
wrote
(2) Narrow Focus
a. KARE {GA/#wa} sinda.
he
NOM/TOP died
‘HE died/It was HE who died.’
b.
WATASI {GA/#wa} tegami
o
kaita.
I
NOM/TOP letter
ACC
wrote
‘I wrote the letter/It was I who wrote the letter.’
The particle wa also exhibits a dual function, marking both topic and
contrast, the latter being another kind of narrow focus. Wa can bear a high
tone with a contrastive NP, but not with a topic NP, as in (3).7
(3) a.kare wa
sinda.
he
TOP
died
‘He died.’
(Topic)
b. KARE WA sinda.
(Contrastive: Narrow Focus)
he
TOP
died
‘HE died (but someone else survived).’
While both types of wa-marked NP can appear in the main clause, only con7 Wa will be glossed with the label TOP throughout this book, but the reader should be
aware that not all wa-marked NPs are really topics. For an argument that topic-wa and
contrastive-wa constitute a case of polysemy and not homonymy, see Miyagawa
(1987) and Shibatani (1990).
38
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
trastive NPs can appear in a subordinate clause.
(4) a.hiro
{ga/#wa} kuru
node
syokuzi
NOM/TOP come
because meal
o
ACC
yooi
preparation
sita.
did
‘Because Hiro will come, (I) prepared a meal.’
b. HIRO {WA/#ga} kuru
node
syokuzi o
yooi
TOP/NOM come
because meal
ACC
preparation
sita.
did
‘(Although the others won’t come,) HIRO will come, so (I)
prepared a meal.’
The entity which functions as topic of the sentence must already be
established or discourse-active (Chafe 1987). Because interrogative pronouns do not satisfy this condition, they cannot be interpreted as topic even
when marked by wa, e.g. (5a), although they can be interpreted as contrastive,
e.g. (5b).
(5) a.dare {ga/#wa} kimasu
ka.
who NOM/TOP come(POL) Q
‘Who will come?’
b. DARE {WA/#ga} kimasu
ka.
who
TOP/NOM come(POL)
Q
‘(I know that some won’t come, but) WHO will come?’
RRG represents these various usages of ga and wa by associating the
NPs in question with the PCS, the LDP, or an ARG inside the core. In (6),
zyoon ga is contrastive (narrow focus), whereas atama ga is a non-topical
argument of i- ‘be good’. The former is in the PCS, and the latter inside the
core, cf. Figure 2.
(6) ZYOON
atama ga
ii.
(Figure 2)
head
NOM is.good
‘JOAN (and only Joan in the current universe of discourse) is smart.’
GA
NOM
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
39
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
PCS
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
N
N
ADJ
zyoon ga
atama ga
ii
FIGURE 2: Narrow Focus and Non-Topical Argument NPs
SENTENCE
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
LDP
PCS
CORE
CORE
NUC
NUC
PRED
NP
PRED
N
Adj
N
V
akarui
zyoon wa
kita
zyoon wa
FIGURE 3: Topic NP-wa
NP
FIGURE 4: Contrastive NP-wa
Wa-marked NPs are either topical or contrastive. The former are associated with the LDP, the latter with the PCS. The sentences in (7) illustrate the
distinction.
(7) a.zyoon
wa
akarui.
cheerful
‘Joan is cheerful.’
(Topic NP-wa)
(Figure 3)
TOP
b. ZYOON
kita.
(Contrastive NP-wa)
came
‘JOAN came (but someone else didn’t).’
WA
(Figure 4)
TOP
Contrastive NP-wa’s and narrow focus NP-ga’s are cognitively similar: both
convey the idea ‘THIS entity, but not something else.’ It is therefore plausible
to associate both with the same node, the PCS.
3.
OPERATORS
In Figure 1, the reader will have noted that the auxiliary verb did was not
assigned any status in the layered structure. In RRG, lexical items appearing
40
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
in the sentence are divided into (i) constituents of the layered structure and (ii)
operators. As remarked, the former consist of the predicate, its arguments,
and adjunct phrases (i.e. periphery); the latter consist of morphemes which
are realizations of grammatical categories, such as aspect, tense, and modal.8
The operators are further divided into subcategories which are grouped
according to the layer they modify. The following is a universal list summarizing the operators and their levels of modification. Of course, a given
language need not grammaticize all operators.
(8) Nuclear Operators
a.Aspect (ASP)
b. Directionals (DIR): only those directionals modifying orientation of
action or event without reference to participants
c.Internal (i.e. narrow scope) Negation (NEG)
(9) Core Operators
a. Directionals (DIR): only those directionals expressing the orientation or motion of one participant with reference to another participant or to the speaker
b. Modals (MOD):9 root modals, e.g. permission, obligation
c.Internal Negation (NEG)
(10)
Clausal Operators
a.Status (STAT): epistemic modals,10 external negation
8 Some researchers, e.g. Vennemann (1973), utilize the term operator differently: an
operator is a constituent that combines with a construction of type A to yield another
construction of type A (i.e. an endocentric construction); thus all modifiers (including
adverbials) can be construed as operators. In RRG adverbials are not operators,
although many of them express concepts similar to those which operators express. An
operator in RRG must be a closed-class grammatical morpheme of limited distribution.
9 In standard RRG, the term modality is used instead of modal. However, following
Nakau (1979, 1992), I regard the former as a purely semantic/pragmatic concept.
Nakau defines modality as the expression of the speaker’s mental attitude toward the
proposition or the speech act at the time of utterance (defined as the speaker’s instantaneous present). This definition does not specify any grammatical categories for
such expressions. Because RRG considers only instances of grammaticized modality
as operators, it is more appropriate to utilize the different term modal in this context.
10 Palmer (1986) defines the term epistemic as any modal which indicates the degree
of commitment by the speaker to what s/he says, including evidentials such as
‘hearsay’ and ‘report’. He asserts that there are basically two types of epistemic
modal systems: one based on judgments, the other on evidence. Some languages, e.g.
English, have only judgment modals, while others, e.g. Tuyuca, have only eviden-
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
41
b. Tense (TNS)
c.Evidentials (EVID)
d. Illocutionary Force (IF): declarative, interrogative, imperative
Note that negation can in principle be operative at any level. However, in
Japanese, no negative operator can directly apply to the clausal layer. In
English, ‘He isn’t promoted because he is kind to his staff’ is ambiguous
between the interpretations of internal and external negation: (i) because he is
kind to his staff, he is not promoted (internal); (ii) it is not the case that he is
promoted because he is kind to his staff, or the reason why he is promoted is
not because he is kind to his staff (external). In Japanese, the structurally
equivalent sentence is not ambiguous: it allows only the interpretation with
internal negation, cf. (11a). External negation requires nominalization of the
two-clause sequence, cf. (11b).
(11) a.kare wa
buka ni
sinsetu da
kara
he
TOP
staff DAT kind
COP-NPST
because
syoosin
si-na-i.
promotion do-NEG-NPST
‘Because he is kind to (his) staff, he is not promoted.’
b. kare wa
buka ni
sinsetu da
kara
he
TOP
staff DAT kind
COP-NPST
because
syoosin
suru
no
de
wa
na-i.
promotion do-NPST NMLZ COP-TE PRT NEG-NPST
‘It is not the case that he is promoted because he is kind to (his)
staff.’
Nai-de is the operator of nuclear-level negation, whereas naku-te and
-zu are the operators of core-level negation.11 The sentences in (12) illus-
tials; still others, e.g. German, combine the two in a single grammatical system.
Japanese belongs to the third group.
11 De in nai-de and te in naku-te are allomorphs of the connective suffix TE. How-
ever, I will treat nai-de and naku-te as distinct and unitary operators in this book.
Note that nai and naku appear between the verb-stem and TE. Shiraishi (1956) claims
that nai-de is derived from the negative form of the verb ar- ‘be (located)’, whereas
naku-te comes from the adjective na-. While nai-de can co-occur only with verbs,
naku-te can occur with both verbs and adjectives. According to Suzuki (1976), who
has examined sentences in nine texts (eight of which are modern novels) for the
characteristics of negative expressions, nai-de occurred 180 times, naku-te 54 times,
and zu 470 times. Forty-seven percent of occurrences of nai-de, 43% of naku-te, and
4% of zu were in conversational parts of the texts.
42
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
trate these two negative operators: (12a) involves nuclear juncture, and (12b)
clausal juncture.
(12) a.zyoon
wa
ban-gohan o
tabe- {nai-de/*naku-te} iru.
dinner
ACC eat
NEG-TE
be-NPST
‘Joan hasn’t eaten dinner.’
TOP
tabe-
-nai-de
NUCLEUS
iNUCLEUS
CORE
b. kodomo ga
yasai
o
tabe- {nai-de/naku-te}
child
NOM vegetable
ACC
eat NEG-TE
komaru.
be.in.trouble-NPST
‘I’m in trouble because (my) child doesn’t eat vegetables.’
tabe-
-nai-de
komar-
NUCLEUS
NUCLEUS
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
tabe-
-naku-te
NUCLEUS
CLAUSE
komarNUCLEUS
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
In RRG the operators are represented separately from the layered
structure (Johnson 1987). The representation of the layered structure itself is
referred to as the constituent projection, and that of the operators, the operator projection, as illustrated in Figures 5 and 6.12
12 As the unmarked case of IF, declaration is often not represented in the diagrams. It
is, however, marked in Figure 5; and in (13), one of the functions of the sentence-final
particle yo is to mark the IF of declaration, and it is so marked in the corresponding
Figure 6.
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
Constituent
Projection
CORE
PERIPH
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
NP
PP
ADV
show
his book
to Mary
yesterday
John
did
not
ARG
ARG
NUC
CORE
Operator
Projection
STAT CLAUSE
TNS
IF
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
SENTENCE
FIGURE 5: Constituent and Operator Projection in RRG
SENTENCE
LDP
CLAUSE
Constituent
Projection
CORE
NP
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
zyoon wa tomodati ni
a-
e-
ta soo yo
NUC
CORE
Operator
Projection
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
MOD
TNS
EVID
IF
SENTENCE
FIGURE 6: Constituent and Operator Projection in RRG of Japanese
(13)
zyoon
wa
tomodati ni
ae- ta soo
yo.
friend
DAT
meet can PST EVID PRT(IF)
‘(I heard that) Joan could meet her friend.’
(Figure 6)
TOP
43
44
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Nexus Types
[-embedded]
[-dependent]
[+dependent]
Coordination
Cosubordination
[+embedded]
Subordination
FIGURE 7: Nexus Types in RRG
4.
JUNCTURE AND NEXUS
The taxonomy of clause linkage in RRG is based on the two concepts nexus
and juncture. Linkages are possible at any layer of the clause in RRG. There
are three juncture types, corresponding to the grammatical level of the linked
units: clausal, core, and nuclear. As for nexus types, two parameters,
[±embedded] and [±dependent], play a role (cf. Chapter 1 §2.3.5). If one unit
is embedded in another, the nexus type is subordination; typical examples are
sentential complements and adverbial clauses. Non-embedded constructions
are further divided according to operator dependency. If one unit is dependent on the other for one or more of the operators at a particular juncture
level (i.e. both units are in the scope of a single operator), the nexus type is
cosubordination. If two units are independent of each other for all operators
at the given level of juncture, the nexus type is coordination. Figure 7 displays this categorization of nexus.
Because there are three types each for both nexus and juncture, the
theory is able to distinguish a total of nine (3x3) linkage types, i.e. clausal
subordination, clausal coordination, clausal cosubordination, core subordination, core coordination, core cosubordination, and so forth.
5.
LINKAGE TYPES
5.1.
Clausal Subordination
In clausal juncture all three nexus types are commonly observed in the
world’s languages. There are two types of clausal subordination: complements and adverbials, as illustrated in Figures 8 to 11.13
13 Note that the embedded clause in Figure 8 does not appear under an ARG node —
which may be counterintuitive if the term argument is taken in the quasi-logical
sense. However, this decision makes sense in light of various differences between
typical arguments and such embedded clauses. For example, unlike arguments, the
embedded clause is not ‘preposable’: ‘This story John told Mary’ vs. *‘That he will
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
45
CLAUSE
CORE
CMPL
CLAUSE
ARG NUC ARG
PRED
NP
John
TNS
told
CORE
NP
Mary
PERIPH
ARG
NUC
ARG
NP
PRED
PP
that he would
arrive at the party late
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
ADV
CLAUSE
FIGURE 8: Clausal (Complement) Subordination in English
LDP
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
PERIPH
NP
NP
zyoon wa tookyoo de
CMPL
CORE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
PRED
PRED
miki ni
at-
ta
to
it-
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
CLAUSE
ta
TNS
FIGURE 9: Clausal (Complement) Subordination in Japanese
(14)
zyoon
wa
TOP
tookyoo
de
miki
LOC
ni
DAT
atta to
meet PST CMPL
it- ta.
(Figure 9)
say PST
‘Joan said that (she) met Miki in Tokyo.’
arrive at the party late John told Mary.’ And certain adverbials may appear between
the verb and the embedded clause: ‘John believed wholeheartedly that Mary was
qualified for the job’ but not between a verb and its argument: *‘John believed
wholeheartedly the story.’ See also Foley and Van Valin (1984), Ch. 6.
46
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
CLAUSE
CORE
PERIPH
ARG NUC ARG
PP
PRED
NP
CORE
saw
Mary
NP
John
TNS
NUC
NUC
P
CORE
after
CLAUSE
ARG
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG NUC
NP
ARG
PRED
PP
he arrived at the party
NUC
CORE
TNS
CLAUSE
FIGURE 10: Clausal (Adverbial) Subordination in English
LDP
CLAUSE
NP
PERIPH
zyoon wa
CLAUSE
CORE
CONJ
NUC
CORE
PRED
ARG
NUC
yorokon-
NP
PRED
NUC
tomodati ga
ki-
ta
node
NUC
da
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 11: Clausal (Adverbial) Subordination in Japanese
(15)
zyoon
wa
TOP
tomodati ga
kifriend
NOM
come
da.
(Figure 11)
ta
PST
node
because
yorokonget.delighted PST
‘Joan was delighted because (her) friend came (to her house).’
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
47
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CONJ
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
ARG NUC
NP
John
TNS
CORE
PRED
ARG NUC
NP
went to the store, but
didn't
NP
PRED
NP
he
forget
his money?
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
STAT
TNS
IF
ARG
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
FIGURE 12: Clausal Coordination in English
5.2.
Clausal Coordination
If two clauses are in clausal coordination, they are independent of each other
with respect to clausal operators; e.g., each conjunct may have a distinct IF.
In ‘John went to the store, but didn’t he forget his money?’ the interrogative IF
has only the second clause in its scope; the first clause is not questioned (see
Figure 12).
The conjunction ga ‘and/but’ in Japanese links clauses in coordination.
(16)
konban uti
de
paatii ga
arimas- u
ga,
tonight house LOC party NOM be(POL) NPST CONJ
irassyaimase- n
ka.
(Figure 13)
come(POL)
NEG-NPST Q
‘There is a party at my home tonight, and won’t you come?’
5.3.
Clausal Cosubordination
When the linked clauses are in clausal cosubordination, one is dependent on
the other with regard to at least one clausal operator. In Figure 14, for example, both tense and illocutionary force are shared by the linked clauses.
48
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
PERIPH
NP
PP
CONJ
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
PRED
PRED
paatii ga
arimas-
konban uti de
u
ga
irassyaimase-
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
n
ka
NEG
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
TNS
IF
FIGURE 13: Clausal Coordination in Japanese
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
PCS
CORE
CORE
ARG NUC
did
NUC
PRED
PRED
PP
Mary
go
to the store
TNS
IF
ARG
NP
NP
What
CONJ CLAUSE
and
buy?
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
FIGURE 14: Clausal Cosubordination in English
The V1-ta-ri V2-ta-ri s- construction (‘do V1 and V2 among other
things’) in Japanese involves clausal cosubordination. Like English do, in
this construction s- ‘do’ appears only in order to provide a ‘prop’ for tense.
The relevant part of Figure 15 is shown in bold face. ( CS in (17) stands for
connective suffix.)
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
LDP
CLAUSE
NP
PERIPH
kinoo wa
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CORE
CONJ
CLAUSE node
CORE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
nani mo
deki-
ARG
NUC
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
PRED
NP
PRED
CORE
tomodati ga
49
ki-tari konpyuutaa ga koware-tari
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
si-ta
CLAUSE
nakat- ta
NEG
TNS
TNS
FIGURE 15: Clausal Cosubordination in Japanese
(17)
5.4.
kinoo
wa tomodati ga
kita- ri
yesterday TOP friend
NOM come
PFV CS
konpyuutaa ga
koware- ta- ri si- ta node
computer
NOM break
PFV CS do PST because
nani mo dekinakat- ta.
(Figure 15)
anything can.do NEG
PST
‘Yesterday, a friend came and the computer broke down, so I
couldn’t accomplish anything.’
Core Subordination
In core juncture, two or more cores, each with its own nucleus and arguments,
are linked. In core subordination, the embedded core as a whole is an
argument of the matrix core, and thus there is no shared argument (see Figure
16).
50
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NUC
ARG
NP
PRED
CORE
John denounced
ARG
NUC
ARG
NP
PRED
NP
Bill' s stealing the car
FIGURE 16: Core Subordination in English
LDP
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NUC
PERIPH
CORE
PRED
NP
ADV
PRED
anata wa
moo
kaette
NUC
i-
i
NUC
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 17: Core Subordination in Japanese
The adjective i- ‘be permitted’14 in Japanese takes a subordinated core
argument which is linked by TE. This linkage type is discussed in detail in
Chapter 5.
(18)
anata wa
moo
kaette
you TOP already go.home-TE
‘You may go home now.’
5.5.
Core Coordination
ii.
be.permitted NPST
(Figure 17)
In a non-embedded nexus at the core level, one argument must be shared
between the linked cores. This shared argument is called the pivot around
14 This i- is distinct from i- ‘be good’. The negative of ‘be permitted’ is ike-na-,
whereas the negative of ‘be good’ is yoku-na-.
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
51
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NP
John could
MOD
CMPL
CORE
NUC ARG
NUC
ARG
PRED
NP
PRED
NP
tell
Bill
wash
the car
to
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
TNS
CLAUSE
FIGURE 18: Core Coordination in English
which the construction is built (Foley and Van Valin 1984). The subject is the
prototypical pivot for the interclausal syntax of both English and Japanese.
Most control phenomena are accounted for in RRG in terms of such argument
sharing (Cutrer 1987, 1993). The accusative plus infinitive construction in
English is an example of core coordination.
(19)
John could tell Bill to wash the car.
(Figure 18)
Sentence (19) shows that the root modal could (a core-level operator) has
scope only over the first conjunct; thus the juncture type is indeed coordination, for there is no operator dependency at the core level of juncture.
A Japanese example of core coordination is the V-zu ni ‘without V-ing’
construction. The subjects of the linked cores must be identical; at the same
time, the first core is negated independently, demonstrating an absence of
core-operator dependency and showing that the nexus type is coordination.
(20)
zyoon
wa
TOP
ni
repooto
report
ta.
o
yoma- zu
read
NEG
(Figure 19)
ACC
ni
CMPL
kicome PST
‘Joan came to the meeting without reading the reports.’
LOC
kaigi
meeting
52
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
LDP
CORE
CMPL
CORE
ARG
NUC
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
NP
PRED
zyoon wa
repooto o
yoma-
kaigi ni
ki-
zu
ni
NUC
ta
NUC
CORE
NEG
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 19: Core Coordination in Japanese
CLAUSE
CORE
PERIPH
CORE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NUC
ARG
NP
PRED
PRED
NP
John
can
MOD
TNS
sit
playing the guitar
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
PP
for hours
CORE
CLAUSE
FIGURE 20: Core Cosubordination in English
5.6.
Core Cosubordination
The scope of the core operators in core cosubordination covers all linked
cores, which is not the case in core coordination.
(21)
John can sit playing the guitar for hours.
(Figure 20)
In (21) the modal can expresses John’s ability not simply to sit but to sit and
play the guitar.
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
LDP
53
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
CMPL
ARG NUC
NP
NP
zyoon wa hon o
PRED
kari
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
ni tosyokan ni ika-
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CORE
nakat- ta
NEG
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 21: Core Cosubordination in Japanese
In Japanese, the V(ren’yoo) ni ‘in order to’ construction, which occurs
with a second core containing a motion verb, is an example of core cosubordination. As with core coordination, the subjects of linked cores must be
identical.
(22)
zyoon
wa
TOP
hon o
book ACC
ta.
kari
borrow
ni
CMPL
tosyokan ni
library
LOC
(Figure 21)
ika- nakatgo NEG
PST
‘Joan didn’t go to the library to borrow some books.’
In (22) the scope of the core negative operator ranges not only over the
second core but also the first core. The sentence may be uttered to express the
notion that Joan went to the library for some other purpose.15 There therefore
is operator dependency at the core level in this construction, the defining
feature of cosubordination.
5.7.
Nuclear Juncture
In nuclear juncture, two or more nuclei are linked to form a complex nucleus
which takes a single set of core arguments. An example is the French causative construction:
15 In such a case, the particle wa is likely to appear after kari ni.
54
ARG
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
NUC
ARG
NUC NUC
NP
Je
PRED PRED
NP
ferai manger les gâteaux
NP
à Jean
FIGURE 22: Nuclear Juncture
(23)
CORE
CORE
ARG NUC ARG
NUC
ARG
PRED
NP
ARG
NP
PRED
NP
Je laisserai Jean
manger les gâteaux
FIGURE 23: Core Juncture
Je ferai
manger les gâteaux
I
will.make eat
the cakes
‘I will make Jean eat the cakes.’
à Jean. (Figure 22)
to
Compare (23) with (24), which involves core coordination.
(24)
Je laisserai Jean manger les gâteaux.
I
will.let
eat
the cakes
‘I will let Jean eat the cakes.’
(Figure 23)
In the core juncture, (24), the argument which is semantically the object of the
first predicate and the subject of the second predicate appears between the
two. In the nuclear juncture (23), on the other hand, the predicates appear
adjacent to each other, and the direct object appears immediately after the
complex nucleus.
In Japanese, TE-linkage is the primary means for effecting nuclear
juncture. Chapters 3 and 4 demonstrate that TE-linked nuclei are either in
subordination or in coordination. A subordinate nucleus does not participate
in determination of the core arguments of the matrix nucleus but only modifies it; by contrast, coordinated nuclei specify a single set of arguments
jointly.
Nuclear juncture is the tightest syntactic linkage. This means that the
items which may intervene between the linked nuclei are very limited; in
Japanese, only a small number of particles can appear in this position. This
structural property is reflected in the meaning as well: the verbals linked in
nuclear juncture frequently form a single concept and exhibit similarities with
lexical compounds, e.g. tabe-hazime- ‘eat-begin’.
However, there are clear differences between nuclear juncture and
lexical compounds. First, although few in number, some particles can indeed
intervene in the former, whereas absolutely no item can intervene in the latter.
Second, the first verbal can be negated independently only in
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
55
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
zyoon ga siken ni otite
simatta
FIGURE 24: Nuclear Subordination in Japanese
the former. Third, the former does not permit further lexical derivation but
the latter does (Ishikawa 1985), e.g. *tabe-te mi kata ‘way of trying to eat’
[intended: tabe ‘eat’, mi ‘see/try’] vs. tabe-hazime-kata ‘way of starting to
eat’.
TE-constructions with an auxiliary verb (in the traditional analysis) are
considered as instances of nuclear juncture in RRG — to be discussed in
detail in Chapters 3 and 4. In this chapter, it will suffice by way of illustration to point out that the construction VERB-TE simaw- ‘put’ is an
example of nuclear subordination. Only a small number of particles can
appear between the TE-predicate and simaw-, and the ditransitive simawdoes not affect the number of core arguments, which remain identical with
those of the VERB-TE. Figure 24 illustrates this nuclear subordination construction, one of whose functions is to express the speaker’s regret.
(25)
zyoon
ga
siken
ni
otite
simatta.
examination DAT fail-TE put-PST
‘Joan failed the exam, to my regret.’
(Figure 24)
NOM
6.
LEXICAL REPRESENTATION OF VERBALS
6.1.
Vendler-Dowty Verb Classes
The lexical representation of verbals plays a more significant role in RRG than
in any other contemporary syntactic theory. Adopting the approach of
Vendler (1957) and Dowty (1979), RRG categorizes verbals according to
their Aktionsart (inherent lexical aspect) into four classes — states, activities,
achievements, and accomplishments.16 Examples of English and Japanese
verbals from each class are given in Table 1.
16 Seven years prior to Vendler, Kindaichi (1950) classified Japanese verbs solely on
the behavior of V-te i- ‘be V-ing, have V-ed’. The results are similar to those of
Vendler’s approach as applied to Japanese verbs. For a comparison of
Kindaichi’s and Vendler’s classification, see Jacobsen (1979, 1982, 1991).
56
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
TABLE 1
Verb Classes
State
have
know
want
be dead
deki- ‘be able to’
ar-, i- ‘be, exist’
omow- ‘think’
nozom- ‘hope’
samu- (Adj) ‘be cold’
hosi- (Adj) ‘want’
Activity
Achievement
Accomplishment
walk
receive
give
eat
learn
teach
watch
die
kill
talk
come
put
aruk- ‘walk’
tuk- ‘arrive’
age-, kure- ‘give’
tabe- ‘eat’
sir- ‘get to know’ osie- ‘teach’
kuras- ‘live’
ware- ‘break’
moraw- ‘obtain’
kaimono s- ‘shop’ toke- ‘melt’
tukur- ‘make’
mi- ‘look at, see’ sin- ‘die’
koros- ‘kill’
nak- ‘cry’
kizuk- ‘realize’
ok- ‘put on’
States and activities have a uniform aspectual structure. That is, if the
meaning of the predicate is represented as predicate´, then predicate´(x)
being true for a certain interval implies that it is true at any instant in the
interval. Achievements and accomplishments have a complex aspectual
structure involving an inherent end-point.
Achievements are inchoative in nature, and accomplishments are inherently causative. Both are derivable from either states or activities by
postulating the operator-connectives BECOME and CAUSE (Dowty 1979).17
While Dowty tends to reject G. Lakoff’s (1972) overall hypothesis that all
words which take ‘sentential complements’ can be reduced to a fixed number
of language-universal operators, he does consider that aspectual categories of
verbals might indeed be reduced in the way proposed by Lakoff. The RRG
representation of such lexical decomposition, or logical structure (LS), is
given in Table 2.
All activity LSs contain the activity predicate do´, which serves as the
marker of membership in this class, e.g. sing do´(x,[sing´(x)]), eat
do´(x,[eat´(x)]). Achievement predicates involve the abstract operator
BECOME and a state LS. For example, the LS of the state predicate be-dead is
dead´(x); correspondingly, the LS of the achievement predicate die is BECOME dead´(x). Accomplishment predicates have the abstract operator
CAUSE in their LS. The LS of kill, for example, is [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME dead´(y)]. Note that the second argument of do´, which is generally
an activity LS , can be null if the predicate indicates
TABLE 2
17 Dowty considers only states to be primitives. In RRG, on the other hand, both
states and activities are treated as primitives, since it is impossible to derive activities
from state predicates.
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
57
Verb Classes and Their Logical Structures
Verb Class
State
Activity
Achievement
Accomplishment
Logical Structure
predicate´(x) or predicate´(x,y)
do´(x, [predicate´(x)]) or do´(x, [predicate´(x,y)])
BECOME [State LS]
 CAUSE , where  and  are any well-formed LS.
However,  is typically an activity, and  an achievement.
only the outcome of the act, not how the outcome is achieved. Kill, for example, indicates only that x causes the death of y; it does not encode how x
accomplishes the killing.
In Japanese, a useful diagnostic of state predicates is that they can appear neither with n-zikan/nenkan ‘for n hours/years’ nor with n-zikan/ nenkan
de ‘in n hours/years’. Activities can co-occur with n-zikan/ nenkan, but not
with n-zikan/nenkan de; achievements and accomplishments can co-occur
with n-zikan/nenkan de, but not with n-zikan/nenkan. Accomplishments can
form lexical compounds with owar- ‘finish’, but states, activities, and
achievements cannot.
Many activity verbs may also appear as the corresponding accomplishment verbs. The accomplishment use is derived by the following lexical
rule (Van Valin 1990:225):
Activity [motion, creation, consumption]  Accomplishment:
Given an activity LS [...predicate1´...], add ‘CAUSE [BECOME
predicate2´...]’ to form a  CAUSE  accomplishment LS.
(26)
The particular nature of predicate2´ depends on the type of activity. Motion
activities (e.g. move) normally take [BECOME (NOT) be-at´(x,y)]; creation
activities (e.g. make) take [BECOME exist´(x)]; consumption activities (e.g.
spend) take [BECOME NOT exist´(x)].
In addition to Aktionsart, the punctual/durative distinction must be
stated as a property of verbals in the lexicon. Activities are durative;
achievements and accomplishments may be either punctual or durative.
Events which are denoted by such verbs as toke- ‘melt’ (achievement) and
tukur- ‘make’ (accomplishment) usually take some time to reach their inherent endpoint (hence durative), whereas those denoted by tuk- ‘arrive’
(achievement) and otos- ‘drop’ (accomplishment) are usually punctual.
However, this punctual/durative distinction is linguistic: it does not necessarily reflect the structure of the real-world events referred to by the predicates. For example, the event referred to by ik- ‘go’ requires
temporal
duration, and yet ik- behaves linguistically as a punctual
accomplishment.
Finally, the lexicon in RRG can include information about agentivity
58
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(controllability) by utilizing the operator DO proposed by Dowty. For example, do´(x, [see´(x,y)]) represents one sense of see, and DO [do´(x,
[see´(x,y)])] represents look at. The Japanese predicate mi- can mean either
see or look at. DO appears in the LS only when agentivity is lexicalized, e.g.,
mi- in the meaning ‘look at’, or koros- ‘kill/murder’, which are [+agentive].
By contrast, the LS of English kill need not have DO because it can express
[–agentive] as well, e.g. The bomb killed many soldiers.
In English most activity verbs permit both [+agentive] and
[–agentive] interpretations. Many activities and accomplishments in Japanese, by contrast, are strictly agentive. Therefore, [–agentive] adverbials, e.g.
guuzen ni ‘accidentally’ and ukkari (to) ‘absentmindedly’, cannot normally
appear with such verbs. This provides a useful diagnostic: if collocation with
a [–agentive] adverbial would yield an anomaly, e.g. (27a), then the predicate
is considered to contain DO. A [–agentive] adverbial can, however, appear
with such verbs if the verb accompanies simaw- ‘put into (an appropriate
place)’, which can force a [–agentive] interpretation in a specific construction, e.g. (27b); see §2 of Chapter 3.
(27) a.# kabin o
guuzen ni
kowasita.
vase
ACC
accidentally broke
‘(I) broke the vase accidentally.’
b.
kabin o
guuzen ni
kowasite
simatta.
vase
ACC
accidentally break-TE put-PST
‘(I) broke the vase accidentally.’
The necessity of dealing with the punctual/durative distinction and the
encoding of agentivity ultimately led Dowty (1979:180-86) to abandon the
Vendler-type classification and propose a set of revised verb classes based on
an interval semantics, as shown in Table 3. However, most of the ‘fuzziness’
observed in Vendler’s classification persists in Dowty’s revised one. Dowty
notes (185):
We have just seen how the distinction between 5-6 and 7-8 [in Table 3]
is fuzzy, not because of syntax, but because of differing expectations
about the way changes will happen over time. Similarly, the agentive/non-agentive distinction depends on one’s imagination for the kinds
of properties that are or could be under voluntary immediate control of a
rational being, as well as one’s imagination for what
TABLE 3
Dowty’s Revised Verb Classes
States
1a.
Nonagentive
be asleep, be in the
2a.
Agentive
possibly be polite, be
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
a hero, etc. (or else in 4.)
interval statives: sit,
stand, lie (with human
subject)
Activities
3. make noise, roll, rain 4. walk, laugh, dance (cf. 2a)
Single change
5. notice, realize, ignore
6. kill, point out (something
of state
to someone)
Complex change 7. flow from x to y,
8. build (a house), walk
of state
dissolve
from x to y, walk a mile
1b.
garden, love, know
interval statives: sit,
stand, lie
59
2b.
entities can be rational, acting beings. Thus not only is this not a categorization of verbs, it is not a categorization of sentences, but rather of
the propositions conveyed by utterances, given particular background
assumptions by speaker and/or hearer about the nature of the situations
under discussion. Despite this “fuzziness”, it is the way these distinctions are ensconced in the syntactic structure of the English language
that gives them their interest and significance.
Dowty’s observations are accurate and insightful. Fuzzy though it is, I
believe that the verb classification adopted in RRG and in this book correctly
reflects native speakers’ knowledge about their languages. Thus, in the
balance of the book, I will maintain the terms state, activity, achievement, and
accomplishment, and also the punctual/durative and the agentive/nonagentive
distinctions. Table 4 below provides the LS of some Japanese verbals.
6.2.
Thematic Relations
In RRG, thematic relations are not defined independently but are derived from
argument positions in the predicate’s LS. As mentioned above, only state and
activity predicates are considered primitives in LS representations;
achievement and accomplishment predicates have a composite LS built up
from state, activity, and various abstract operator(s). Basing itself on
Jackendoff (1976), RRG defines six thematic relations — AGENT, EFFECTOR, EXPERIENCER, LOCATIVE, THEME, and PATIENT — in terms of their
argument positions in the LS representations. This is illustrated in (28) and
(29).
TABLE 4
Japanese Verbals and Their Logical Structures
Verbal
STATES
i-, ar-
Gloss
be
have
Logical Structure
be-at´(x,y)
have´(x,y)
60
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
hosi- (Adj)
kikoemie-
want
be audible
be visible
want´(x,y)
audible´(x); audible´(x,y)
visible´(x); visible´(x,y)
ACTIVITIES
nakhasiryom-
cry
run
read
do´(x, [cry´(x)])
DO [do´(x, [run´(x)])]
DO [do´(x, [read´(x,y)])]
ACHIEVEMENTS
simarclose (VI)
wakarunderstand
nakunardisappear
nakuslose
morawreceive
kcome
BECOME closed´(x)
BECOME understand´(x,y)
BECOME NOT visible´(x)
BECOME NOT have´(x,y)
BECOME have´(x,y)
BECOME be-at´(y,x)
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
kcome
ikgo
miseshow
okput on
simawput away
age-, kuregive
simeclose (VT)
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME be-at´(y,x)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME be-at´(y,x)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [see´(y,z)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME be-on´(y,z)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME be-at´(y,z)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME have´(y,z)]
DO [do´(x,)] CAUSE [BECOME close´(y)]
(28)
A.
B.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
STATES
Locational:
be-at´(x,y)
Non-Locational:
State or condition: broken´(x)
Perception:
see´(x,y)
Cognition:
believe´(x,y)
Possession:
have´(x,y)
Equational:
be´(x,y)
(29) ACTIVITIES
A. Uncontrolled:
1. Non-motion:
2. Motion:
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
x=PATIENT
x=EXPERIENCER, y=THEME
x=EXPERIENCER, y=THEME
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
do´(x, [cry´(x)])
do´(x, [learn´(x,y)])
roll´(x)
x=EFFECTOR
x=EFFECTOR,
y=LOCATIVE
x=THEME
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
B.
Controlled:
DO [do´(x, [run´(x)])]
61
x=AGENT
Locational statives have two arguments, LOCATIVE and THEME;
non-locational statives have either one, PATIENT, or two, the exact combination of thematic relations depending on the predicate type. Activity predicates have either one or two arguments. If there is only one argument, it is an
EFFECTOR, which is the participant that brings something about; the label
EFFECTOR, however, conveys no implication of the volitionality of the
designated participant. The EFFECTOR is defined as the first argument of do´
in an activity LS. When there are two arguments in an activity LS, the first is
an EFFECTOR and the second a THEME. The AGENT is defined as the first
argument of DO, which serves as the marker of agentivity. All AGENTS are
EFFECTORS, but not vice versa.
RRG does not attempt to propose an exhaustive list of thematic relations,
but rather regards thematic relations as mnemonics for particular argument
positions in LS configurations. The thematic relations RECIPIENT, GOAL,
and SOURCE (which are considered subtypes of a more general LOCATIVE
relation) are defined as:
(30)
RECIPIENT: First argument in LS configuration
‘... BECOME have´(x,y)’
GOAL:
SOURCE:
6.3.
First argument in LS configuration
‘... BECOME be-at/in/on´(x,y)’
First argument in LS configuration
‘... BECOME NOT have´/be-at/in/on´(x,y)’
Macroroles
We have already defined a handful of thematic relations (i.e. labels for argument positions in specific LS configurations). But attaching too much
importance to such labels and to the exact semantic relations they represent
soon puts us in a dilemma. Consider two-place activity LSs, for example, for
which the second argument has been identified as a THEME. This label is
satisfactory for predicates like eat, drink, or make, but it is blatantly inappropriate for predicates like play (music): in I played the Goldberg Variations, the pieces of music are not affected in any way. To take another
example, on semantic grounds one may be inclined to call the second argument of a perceptual predicate a STIMULUS, and of a cognitive predicate a
CONTENT, rather than a THEME. A priori, such a sensitivity to semantic
nuance would seem a good thing; but in the present cases, in fact, providing
more adequate labels actually leads to a loss of generalization.
62
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
RRG gives relatively little weight to the labels and precise semantics of
thematic relations themselves, but places more focus on contrasts among such
relations. If we examine representative members of the four predicate classes, we soon come to realize that certain pairs of thematic relations, e.g.
LOCATIVE-EXPERIENCER or THEME-PATIENT, never co-occur in the LS of
any predicate, and that the absence of such combinations is not accidental but
semantically motivated; we can then investigate which combinations actually
are encoded in the semantics of natural language predicates. Thus coining
more finely-grained labels for thematic relations that never contrast but are
treated alike, e.g. STIMULUS and CONTENT, is not particularly profitable.
The approach taken to this problem in RRG is to recognize two groups of
thematic relations that contrast. These are called the macroroles of Actor and
Undergoer. The number and choice of macroroles that any given predicate
takes are normally predictable from its LS representation.
6.4.
The Actor-Undergoer Hierarchy
The Actor and the Undergoer (the subject and the direct object of active
sentences in accusative languages) are selected from the entities appearing in
the predicate’s LS. The selection is based on the Actor-Undergoer hierarchy
in Figure 25.
According to this hierarchy, the unmarked selection of Actor is AGENT,
if there is one in the predicate’s LS; if not, EFFECTOR is selected; if neither
AGENT nor EFFECTOR is present, EXPERIENCER is selected, and so forth.
Likewise, the unmarked Undergoer is PATIENT, followed by THEME and
then by LOCATIVE. We return to the theoretical status of these thematic
relations, and their use as realizations of the macroroles of actor and undergoer, in Chapter 3 §3.4.
Actor
Undergoer
AGENT EFFECTOR EXPERIENCER LOCATIVE THEME PATIENT
SOURCE PATH GOAL RECIPIENT
FIGURE 25: Actor-Undergoer Hierarchy in RRG
Chapter 2: Basic Concepts in RRG of Japanese
63
The coming chapters will utilize all the notions laid out above: (a) layered structure of the clause (nucleus, core, clause), (b) operator (aspect,
negative, tense, illocutionary force, etc.), (c) juncture (nuclear, core, clausal),
(d) nexus (coordination, subordination, cosubordination), (e) aspectual
classes of verbals (states, activities, achievements, accomplishments), (f)
logical structure of verbals, and (g) macroroles selected according to the
Actor-Undergoer Hierarchy.
CHAPTER 3
TE-LINKAGE WITH NUCLEAR JUNCTURE:
PART I
TE can link any two units of the same type, i.e. two nuclei, two cores, or two
clauses. As remarked in Chapter 2, the criterion for nuclear juncture is that
the two linked nuclei take a single set of arguments. Japanese permits relatively unrestricted ellipsis, however, and hence arguments of linked verbals at
any juncture level may fail to be overtly present.1 In elliptical sentences,
therefore, two verbals may appear to be linked at the nuclear level even when
the linkage is actually at the core or the clausal level, so that the determination
of juncture level is not always transparent. However, those verbals which can
appear as a second conjunct in nuclear juncture are in fact very limited in
number, with the meaning of the resultant complex unit dependent in large
measure on this second nucleus and on the nexus type. The analysis of
TE-linkage at the level of nuclear juncture is thus simpler, and therefore that is
where I shall begin.
Twelve verbals can appear as second conjunct in nuclear TE-linkage.
Four of them — simaw- ‘put into an appropriate place’, i- ‘exist, be (animate)’, mi- ‘see’, and mise- ‘show’ — do not affect the valence of the complex nucleus, whereas the others — ar- ‘exist, be (inanimate)’, ik- ‘go’, k‘come’, ok- ‘put on’, age-/kure- ‘give’, moraw- ‘receive, obtain’, and hosi‘be wanted’ — do affect the valence. Some verbals appear in nuclear subordination; others appear in nuclear coordination; still others appear in both
nexus types. This chapter examines nuclear TE-linkage with simaw- and ar-.
The organization of the chapter is as follows. Section 1 presents a
1 Suppression of a particular NP (especially the subject), as opposed to pronominal-
ization (the usual strategy in English), is one of the principal devices for expressing
discourse cohesion in Japanese. Rich semantic specification of argument structure
(selectional restrictions), the use of honorific expressions, and the presence of
psych-predicates frequently serve to signal whether the subjects of TE-linked constituents are identical or distinct (Kameyama 1985, 1988). And, above all, the discourse context almost always specifies the referent of the subjects, so that the
ambiguities so often discussed in the linguistic literature are more potential than
actual.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
65
number of unique properties of nuclear juncture vis-à-vis core/clausal juncture. In Section 2, TE-linkage with simaw- as second constituent is investigated. Section 3 deals with TE-constructions with ar-; the discussion centers
upon two distinct syntactic patterns and argues that they reflect the perfect-resultative distinction in the domain of semantics and/or pragmatics.
1.
NUCLEAR VS. CORE/CLAUSAL JUNCTURE
1.1.
Diagnostic Tests
There are several diagnostics for the distinction in TE-linkage between nuclear juncture, on the one hand, and core and clausal juncture on the other.
Nuclear juncture is subject to (i) restrictions on possible intervening elements, (ii) obligatory joint participation in the domains of core-level and
clause-level operators, and (iii) an intonational restriction: obligatory absence
of major phrase boundaries. Regarding (i), only the particles wa, mo, koso,
made, sae, and nante can appear between the linked nuclei, whereas in core or
clausal juncture other items can intervene between the two conjuncts (except
with core subordination). As for (ii), the linked nuclei jointly form a complex
nucleus; this falls within the core, and the core in turn is included in the
clause. Thus, neither of two linked nuclei can be separately affected by
core-level or clause-level operators; all linked nuclei are jointly within the
scope of any higher-level operator. It is diagnostic test (ii) which serves to
distinguish nuclear juncture from core subordination, for a subordinate core
can be independently negated by the core-level negative operator naku-te (cf.
Chapter 2 §3). While the nuclear-level negative operator nai-de can be suffixed to the first conjunct at all juncture levels, this is impossible for naku-te if
the juncture is at the nuclear level. Thus, diagnostics (i) and (ii) in combination can uniquely identify nuclear juncture. The juncture must be at the
nuclear level if (i) only the above-mentioned particles may intervene between
the conjuncts in question, and (ii) naku-te cannot negate the first.
In addition, intonational contours (iii) serve to indicate the distinction
between nuclear and core/clausal juncture. In the Tokyo dialect of Japanese,
if the first syllable of a word consists of one mora and is unaccented, the first
syllable is associated with a low tone (L) and the second syllable with a high
tone (H).2 (If the first syllable consists of more than one mora, i.e. is a heavy
syllable, this disagreement in tone is optional.) For example, ikú ‘go’ (NPST)
2 These L and H are not inherent in a lexical item, but rather are inserted at the phrase
level. Pierrehumbert and Beckman (1988) call them boundary L and phrasal H,
respectively.
66
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
in the citation form has this LH tonal configuration. When two or more words
are concatenated, some H’s are suppressed, forming a minor phrase
(McCawley 1968). The minor phrase is a prosodic unit in which at most one
H occurs. When minor phrases are concatenated, each successive H is slightly
lower than the preceding H — a phenomenon known as downstep.3 The
domain of downstep forms another prosodic unit called the major phrase
(Poser 1984, Beckman and Pierrehumbert 1986); downstep occurs within a
single major phrase. At a major phrase boundary, the fundamental frequency
range is reset, so that the initial H in each major phrase is not constrained to be
lower than the preceding H, relative to the global declination line.4
While the conjuncts in nuclear juncture necessarily form a single major
phrase (and usually a minor phrase), those in core/clausal juncture need not.
For example, when mótte ‘carry-TE’ and kúru ‘come’ (NPST) are linked in
nuclear juncture, they form either a single minor phrase (mótte kuru) or a
single major phrase (mótte kúru with a downstep), but they cannot form two
major phrases. On the other hand, when these two verbs occur in core/clausal
juncture, a major-phrase boundary can be inserted between them.
In traditional Japanese grammar, those verbs which appear as second
constituent in a nuclear-level TE-construction have been treated as auxiliaries.
This analysis reflects native speakers’ semantic intuitions that the complex
nucleus consisting of the TE-predicate and such an ‘auxiliary’ verb encodes a
single concept. Nuclear juncture is the tightest linkage in syntax, and this
syntactic tightness reflects the semantic tightness. The linked nuclei, in fact,
frequently exhibit similarities with lexical compounds; some researchers (e.g.
Nakau 1976, Miyara 1981, Sugioka 1984, Miyagawa 1989, Jacobsen 1991)
even consider the sequence ‘V-TE V’ a lexical unit.
However, there is little evidence for this last analysis. First, while true
lexical compounds permit further lexical derivation (Ishikawa 1985), the
sequence ‘V-TE V’ never undergoes such derivation (Lee 1989). For example, toki ‘time’ can be attached to the lexical compound moti-tuzuke‘hold+continue’>‘keep something’ and kai-tatak- ‘buy+beat’>‘beat down the
price’ to form moti-tuzuke-doki ‘time for keeping something’ and
kai-tataki-doki ‘time to beat down the price’. By contrast, toki cannot be
3 This phenomenon is also called catathesis (Poser 1984, Beckman and
Pierrehumbert 1986, Pierrehumbert and Beckman 1988).
4For further discussion of the prosodic structure of the Tokyo dialect, see McCawley
(1968), Haraguchi (1977), Beckman and Pierrehumbert (1986), Kubozono (1987,
1989, 1993), Pierrehumbert and Beckman (1988), Selkirk and Tateishi (1988, 1991),
and Hata and Hasegawa (1992). For global declination of fundamental frequency, see
Ladd (1984) and Liberman and Pierrehumbert (1984).
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
67
attached to a ‘V-TE V’ sequence; e.g. from motte-i- ‘hold-TE+be’>‘keep
something’ and katte-simaw- ‘buy-TE+put’>‘buy something’, we cannot form
*motte-i-doki ‘time for keeping something’ and *katte-simai-doki ‘time for
buying something’.
Second, while the particles wa, mo, koso, made, sae, and nante can
appear between the linked nuclei, such intrusion is not permitted with real
lexical compounds, e.g. yon-de wa iru ‘read-TE+WA+be; IS reading’ (with
focus on is) vs. *yomi-wa-hazimeru (lexical compound) ‘will BEGIN to read’
[intended].
Third, the nuclear-level negative operator nai-de, which can negate the
TE-predicate alone, can never appear inside a lexical compound, e.g.
yoma-nai-de iru ‘have not read’ vs. *yomi/yoma-nai-de-tuzukeru (lexical
compound) ‘will continue not reading’ [intended]. These facts suggest that
‘V-TE V’ sequences must be accounted for in the syntax, not in the lexicon.
Note, however, that some ‘V-TE V’ sequences do undergo phonological
integration. For example, V-te simau ‘finish V-ing’, V-te iru ‘be V-ing’, and
V-te oku ‘have V-ed’ are frequently contracted to V-tyau, V-teru, and V-toku,
respectively, in a colloquial register. I consider this phenomenon to be attributable to a postsyntactic process, as proposed in Shibatani and Kageyama
(1988).
1.2.
Propositionality
As discussed in Chapter 1 §2.2, TE-constructions have traditionally been
categorized according to whether the second conjunct is an ‘auxiliary’ or not.
Although the term auxiliary has never been clearly defined, this categorization does appear to reflect native speakers’ intuitive understanding of
TE-constructions. The two categories (predicate+‘auxiliary’ and predicate+predicate) are felt to be some-how distinct.
This distinction corresponds roughly to the division between nuclear
and core/clausal juncture in RRG. From the RRG perspective, the distinction
is significant because each conjunct in core/clausal juncture can denote a
separate proposition, whereas in nuclear juncture it cannot. Native speakers
are aware that the TE-linkage occurring in core/clausal juncture indicates the
relationship between propositions, whereas that occurring in nuclear juncture
indicates the relationship between verbals.
2.
TE SIMAW- CONSTRUCTION
2.1.
Nuclear Subordination
68
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Although it is perfectly possible for both verbs to retain their full autonomy in
the sequence ‘V-te simaw-’ in core juncture, it is extremely common for
simaw- to act as a kind of helping verb and thus for the combination to constitute a special construction. This construction involves nuclear juncture, as
the standard diagnostics show: a major-phrase boundary between V-te and
simaw- is prohibited, and only wa and mo (and sae for some speakers) can
appear between the linked nuclei. As for negative operators, although the
nuclear-level nai-de can, in principle, appear between the conjuncts, it rarely
does, because of the semantics of the construction — which will be discussed
later.
Although the verb simaw- ‘put’5 is lexically ditransitive, when it appears in the TE SIMAW- construction it does not increase the number of core
arguments, nor does it impose any selectional restriction on those arguments:
the core arguments remain identical with those of the TE-predicate, cf. (1a).
(1) a.zyoon
ga
NOM
hen na
hon o
yonde (*tukue ni)
obscene book ACC read-TE desk LOC
simatta.
put-PST
‘Joan has read an obscene book (*in the desk).’
(One Major Phrase: Nuclear Subordination)
b. zyoon
ga
NOM
hen na
obscene
hon o
book ACC
yonde,
read-TE
tukue ni
desk LOC
simatta.
put-PST
‘Joan read an obscene book and put (it) in the desk.’
(Two Major Phrases: Core Coordination, cf. Chapter 5)
The nexus type involved in (1a) is determined to be subordination. In
nuclear subordination, the subordinate predicate semantically modifies some
property of the matrix predicate; in particular, in (1a), simaw- indicates
5 For the sake of brevity, the verb simaw- will be glossed here as ‘put’, instead of the
more accurate ‘put into an appropriate place’. In Classical Japanese, simaw- was used
to indicate ‘finish’, and the sense ‘put into an appropriate place’ was derived from
‘finish’: when people have finished some work, they return the instruments/materials
to their appropriate places. However, in Modern Japanese the sense ‘finish’ has
survived only in fixed expressions, e.g. mise o simaw- ‘quit business’ (mise ‘store’);
the noun o-simai ‘end, finish’ likewise retains the original meaning. The semantic
similarity between this old meaning ‘finish’ and the perfective use of TE SIMAW- is
undoubtedly not accidental.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
69
completion.6 This is parallel to adverbial subordination on the clause level,
in which the subordinate clause modifies the matrix clause in various ways.
Figure 1 represents nuclear subordination. Note that because simaw- is not
predicative of any core argument, there is no PRED-node dominating it. We
will discuss this special configuration shortly, but let us first summarize and
discuss Makiuchi’s (1972) description of TE SIMAW-, which is representative
of hitherto-proposed analyses.
2.2.
Makiuchi’s Analysis
Makiuchi (1972:117-23) claims that the invariant semantic value of TE
SIMAW- is [+completion], and that the construction has an additional feature
[±expected], depending on the context. With [+expected], the construction
emphasizes the completion of the TE-situation (the situation denoted by the
TE-marked constituent), whereas with [–expected], it expresses the speaker’s
reaction towards the unexpected (and completed) TE-situation.
As Makiuchi points out, TE SIMAW- may specify the aspect of the
TE-predicate as being perfective, as shown in (2b). In (2a), the aspect of tabe‘eat’ (activity) is unspecified; the speaker is demanding merely that the addressee perform an act of eating, and (2a) can be interpreted as ‘Start eating!’
With (2b), on the other hand, the speaker is demanding that the addressee
perform an act of eating as a single whole, implying thereby the completion of eating (i.e., the conjoined nuclei as a whole
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
zyoon ga hen na hon o yonde simatta
‘Joan has read an obscene book.’ (= 1a)
FIGURE 1: Nuclear Subordination
serve as an accomplishment).7
6 There are other possible interpretations of (1a), which will be discussed later in this
section.
7 Sentence (2b) does not necessarily presuppose that the addressee has already started
70
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(2) a.gohan o
tabe- nasai.
meal
ACC
eat
IMP
‘Eat your meal!’
b. gohan o
tabete
meal
ACC
eat-TE
‘Finish your meal!’
simaiput
nasai.
IMP
Contra Makiuchi, however, TE SIMAW- situations need not be
[+completed]. As shown in (3), the lexical compound yari-tuzuke- ‘do+
continue’ (imperfective) can appear with TE SIMAW-. In this case, TE
SIMAW- indicates the speaker’s regret.
(3) ikenai
to
wa
omotte
mo, tui
no.good QUOT TOP think-TE PRT unintentionally
konpyuutaa geemu o
yari-tuzukete
simau.
computer
game ACC do.continue-TE put-NPST
‘Although I think it’s not good, I keep on playing computer games.’
Makiuchi defines [+expected] as an emphasis on the completion of the
event in question (117). This characterization is inaccurate. In (4), for example, the speaker has anticipated Joan’s coming to a certain place, but the
semantics of the sentence does not involve any emphasis on completion.
Rather, the sentence indicates that the state of affairs is undesirable for the
speaker.
(4) yahari
zyoon ga
as.anticipated Joan
NOM
‘Joan came, I’m afraid.’
kite
simatta.
come-TE put-PST
Nor can Makiuchi’s analysis account for the function of simaw- in (5b).
(5) a.#zyoon
ga
guuzen ni
tegami o
suteta.
accidentally letter
ACC
threw.away
‘Accidentally, Joan threw the letter away.’
NOM
b.
zyoon
ga
NOM
guuzen ni
tegami o
accidentally letter
ACC
simatta.
put-PST
‘Accidentally, Joan threw the letter away.’
eating.
sutete
throw.away-TE
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
71
As discussed in Chapter 2 §6, many activity and accomplishment predicates
in Japanese (including sute- ‘throw away’ in (5a,b)) encode agentivity.8 A
collocation of a lexically agentive predicate and a nonagentive adverbial, e.g.
guuzen ni ‘accidentally’, omowazu ‘unintentionally’, or ukkari (to) ‘absentmindedly’, results in an anomalous sentence (5a). In such a case TE SIMAWis used to cancel the lexical agentivity and makes the sentence acceptable
(5b).
Makiuchi also claims that ‘emotion verbs’ can appear in TE SIMAW-,
but only with [–expected].
(6) nikunde wa ikenai
to
omoi nagara nikunde simatta.
hate-TE PRT must-NEG QUOT think while hate-TE put-PST
‘While I thought I shouldn’t hate him/her, I did hate him/her.’
(Makiuchi 1972:122, modified)
If we interpret emotion verbs as those verbals that express psychological
states, (7) counts as a counterexample. (7) is explicitly [+expected]; what is
emphasized, rather, is [–agentive].
(7) dame
no.good
daroo to
PROV QUOT
omotte
think-TE
ita
keredo,
be-PST but
sirase
notice
o
ACC
kiita
toki wa yahari
kanasiku natte
simatta.
heard time TOP as.expected be.sad
become-TE put-PST
‘I anticipated that I wouldn’t make it [e.g. passing an exam], but I
couldn’t help becoming depressed when I heard the notice [that I
had failed].’
Despite the inadequacy shown above, Makiuchi’s analysis provides a
good basis for the further investigation of the TE SIMAW- construction. In the
next subsections, I will discuss the properties of TE SIMAW- that Makiuchi
laid out in the RRG framework.
2.3.
Nuclear-Layer Modification: Operator Construction
As shown in §2.1, the TE SIMAW- construction involves nuclear subordination; simaw-, the subordinate predicate, semantically modifies some property
of the matrix predicate. The central definitional constraint on the semantic
8 For alternative analyses of inherent agentivity as implicature, see Holisky (1987)
and Van Valin and Wilkins (forthcoming).
72
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
relations between linked nuclei in subordination is that the subordinate
predicate must modify only the ‘bare’ matrix predicate itself, with no attention to its arguments. Because a nucleus cannot denote a proposition, this
constraint entails that the subordinate predicate cannot modify a proposition.
The modifications possible with nuclear subordination TE-linkage include
functions normally fulfilled by nuclear operators, e.g. aspect and directionality.
The question then arises as to why subordinate predicates are not
themselves considered to be nuclear operators. They are not operators proper
because they do not form a closed class of grammatical morphemes with
limited distribution. For example, adverbials of time in a nonfinite clause
(e.g. ‘Leaving San Francisco yesterday, Joan will arrive in Albuquerque on
Wednesday’) can express whether the event takes place before the speech
time or after it — which is the standard function of the operator tense — yet,
as mentioned in Chapter 2 §3, adverbials are not considered to be operators in
RRG. Analogously, although they may often be functionally equivalent,
subordinate predicates by themselves are not nuclear operators.
On the other hand, it is significant that although subordinate predicates
are not operators morphosyntactically, they nevertheless function semantically as operators when appearing in a TE-construction with nuclear subordination. This dual characterization can be captured in RRG by projecting a
subordinate predicate in both the constituent and the operator projection, as
shown in Figure 2. Nuclear subordination can thus be
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
zyoon ga hen na hon o yonde simat- ta
NUC
ASP
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 2: Operator Construction (Nuclear Subordination)
characterized as an operator construction — that is, nuclear subordination
recasts a verbal morpheme so that it functions as an operator.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
73
OPERATOR CONSTRUCTION
Syntax:
Semantics:
Nuclear Subordination
Subordinate predicate modifies the bare matrix predicate.
The complex nucleus resulting from nuclear modification by simawconveys the semantics of perfectivity and/or nonagentivity. Traditionally,
perfective aspect is considered to be opposed to imperfective: perfective
indicates the verbal event as a unitary whole, without distinction of its separate phases, i.e. inception, continuation/progression, and termination (Comrie
1976, Maslov 1988). Perfective must be distinguished from perfect, which
expresses present relevance of a past situation; the complex nucleus in the TE
SIMAW- construction need not express such relevance.
As discussed in Chapter 2 §6, a verb’s lexical entry contains inherent
information about agentivity; the verb’s inherent lexical meaning (perfectivity) can in turn be modified aspectually by TE SIMAW-. Non-agentivity and
perfectivity are both natural properties of the matrix predicate itself; core
arguments are conceptually irrelevant. Therefore, attributing these functions
to nuclear subordination with TE SIMAW- is very much in keeping with the
central constraint on the semantic relationships between linked predicates in
nuclear subordination.
On the other hand, simaw- as a subordinate predicate may also indicate
the speaker’s attitude toward the proposition as a whole, i.e. modality (cf.
Chapter 1 §3.3), which appears to be a patent violation of the central constraint. For example, simaw- in (1a) may indicate the speaker’s negative
attitude toward the situation, i.e. ‘Joan has read an obscene book, to my
regret.’ However, modality in general is essentially a semantic/ pragmatic
notion, and therefore we should not expect modality expressions to syntactically modify the constituent denoting the proposition. In extreme cases, a
modality expression need not form a syntactic constituent at all. For example,
in English I don’t think in ‘I don’t think Sue left this morning, {*do I?/did
she?}’ is not a syntactic constituent, and yet it should be analyzed as a unit of
modality expression in order to account for the irregular behavior of tag
questions. When no modality expression is involved, a tag must be associated
with the matrix clause, as shown in ‘He doesn’t think Sue left this morning,
{does he?/*did she?},’ while when the matrix predicate is a modality expression (e.g. I don’t think), a tag can be directly associated with a lower
clause (Nakau 1992). Furthermore, a modality expression need not be attached to a constituent which denotes a proposition at all, but can syntactically modify a lexical NP (as opposed to a nominalized clause), e.g. kind of in
74
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘A mastodon is kind of an elephant’ (Kay 1984). 9 Although a complete
analysis of modality in Japanese is beyond the scope of the present book, I
maintain that a modality expression need not be attached to a syntactic constituent which denotes a proposition. Semantically, TE SIMAW- indeed can
qualify the proposition as a whole; but this says nothing about its syntactic
integration into the clause, which can perfectly well be at the nuclear level.
In the following, I will characterize the semantics of TE SIMAW- in
terms of four concepts — factuality, perfectivity, agentivity, and modality —
which will be defined in the next two subsections.
2.4.
Contextual Effects
It is frequently claimed that the function of simaw- in TE SIMAW- is supposed
to depend on context. However, descriptions which contain such a statement
are not satisfactory unless they explicitly state which contextual effects
should count as relevant. In order to characterize TE SIMAW-, three kinds of
contextual effects must be taken into consideration: factuality, perfectivity,
and agentivity.
I will use the term factuality to refer to the dimension of realis-irrealis:
factual propositions are taken to be facts, whereas nonfactual propositions are
not.10 Factuality is determined by the interaction of tense, modality, evidentiality, and illocutionary force. For example, affirmative propositions in
the past tense are factual; those in the conditional or imperative are nonfactual. Here we are concerned with the complex nucleus involving simaw-; and
tense, modality, evidentiality, and illocutionary force are not intrinsically
associated with the nuclear level at all. Hence factuality, as determined by
these concepts, can properly be seen as a contextual notion.
The perfective, which is the opposite of the imperfective (and the unmarked member of the opposition), expresses a dynamic situation as a single
whole. Thus, only nonstatives can be perfective. A punctual achievement,
which has no internal structure, is automatically perfective simply by virtue of
9 See also Kinjo (1992) for the Japanese hedge nante.
10 This opposition was originally inspired by Kiparsky and Kiparsky’s notion of
factivity (1970). They contend that factive presuppositions arise from factive verbs,
i.e., verbs whose complements are presupposed to be true (i.e. facts). Examples of
factive verbs include regret, surprise, know, remember, realize, and resent, whereas
nonfactive verbs include suppose, assert, allege, claim, conjecture, and believe. The
Japanese counterparts of such verbs behave similarly. However, my notion of ‘factuality’ is so different from theirs that I felt it better to use a distinct term.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
75
its inherent inability to be imperfective. On the other hand, if the
TE-predicate is a durative achievement, or an accomplishment, or an activity
which has undergone the standard lexical rule (cf. Chapter 2 §6.1) to form the
corresponding accomplishment verb, the perfective marker implies that the
endpoint has been realized. In this case, perfectivity is equivalent to completion. By contrast, if the TE-predicate is simply an activity, then the perfective merely indicates the absence of imperfective semantics (the marked
member of the opposition). For example, the activity verb with the simple
past tense (susi o) tabeta ‘ate (sushi)’ simply indicates that the activity of
sushi-eating has taken place; whether or not the actor ate all (or some fixed
amount) of sushi is immaterial.
Finally, agentivity as a contextual effect is defined as the determination
of agentivity/nonagentivity by some element outside the complex nucleus,
typically adverbials, e.g. wazato ‘intentionally’, guuzen ni ‘accidentally’,
omowazu ‘unintentionally’, and ukkari (to) ‘absent-mindedly’. These three
concepts — factuality, perfectivity, and agentivity — all contribute to the
analysis of TE SIMAW-.
2.5.
Modality of Regret/Surprise
TE SIMAW- may indicate a certain kind of mental attitude, or modality, on the
part of the speaker toward the proposition or speech act. The specification of
such an attitude is hard to make precise. Generally, however, the TE SIMAWconstruction indicates that the speaker regrets or is surprised at the actual
occurrence of what is denoted by the proposition. Underlying these concepts
is often the notion of unexpectedness, and in this respect Makiuchi’s term
[–expected] is justified. However, it must be noted that regret, at least, is not
at all incompatible with [+expected]: one may have anticipated some event,
but nevertheless regret it when it has happened. Therefore, the term modality
of regret/surprise, rather than [–expected], will be used in this book.
The mental attitude indicated by TE SIMAW- may be the speaker’s attitude toward the speech act, rather than toward the proposition. Nakau
(1992) refers to the speaker’s attitude toward the speech act by the term
discourse modality, and toward the proposition by the term sentence modality. Ono and Suzuki (1992) implicitly acknowledge a similar distinction in
the usages of TE SIMAW-. They posit four kinds of interpretation: (i) inability
to undo, (ii) speaker’s negative attitude, (iii) speaker’s guiltily positive attitude, and (iv) automatic (equivalent to [–agentive] in our terminology). In
their analysis, (i-iii) are related through a process of grammaticization that
76
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
incorporates the speaker’s attitude. They claim: ‘The lexical verb shimau has
been grammaticized into an auxiliary shimau/chau, which conveys the
meaning of “inability to undo.” It has then taken on a sense of the speaker’s
negative attitude, since many situations which have become unchangeable
often have undesirable consequences for the speaker. Further, this meaning is
later extended to convey the speaker’s guiltily positive attitude, i.e., pleasure
mixed with some guilt about the situation’ (1992:211).
Ono and Suzuki provide three examples for speaker’s guiltily positive
attitude (iii), all naturally uttered sentences, viz. (8a-c).11
(8) a.uno o
yatte shimai-mashi-ta
yo.
Uno OBJ do
SHIMAU-POLITE-PST PTL
‘(I) played Uno (with the girls).’
b. boku dat-tara itadai-chau
I
COP-if
have-CHAU
‘I would have (her).’
kedo.
but
c.atashi sa
kookoosee
ni sa ... nanpa
I
PTL high.school.student by PTL approach
s-are-chat-ta.
do-PASS-CHAU-PST
‘I was approached by high school boys ...’
Sentence (8a) was uttered by a male speaker in reporting that he had fun
playing Uno (a card game) during a ski trip. In (8b), the interlocutors were
talking about a mutual (male) friend who received a gift from a married
woman and was harassed by her husband. By uttering (8b), the speaker
indicates that if he were in the friend’s position, he would go on to be intimate
with her. The speaker of (8c) is a woman who felt flattered at being approached by teen-aged boys. Ono and Suzuki observe that in these instances
the speakers do not have a negative attitude toward the proposition at all;
rather, the speakers feel a bit guilty because the hearer did not partake of their
good fortune, or because the situation involves the violation of a social code.
Although the difference between (ii) and (iii) — i.e. speaker’s negative
attitude and speaker’s guiltily positive attitude — is important, the label
guiltily positive attitude is unfortunate, for it sounds like an oxymoron.
Negative attitudes may exist for various reasons, and do not necessarily imply
11 Transcriptions and glosses are Ono and Suzuki’s.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
77
that the speaker evaluates the reported event itself negatively. Rather, the
negativity can be focused on the speech act, on the act of telling. One may, for
example, have a negative attitude if one has to announce one’s success in an
awkward situation. This does not indicate that the speaker considers his/her
success negatively.
Our conclusion, then, is that TE SIMAW- can indicate the speaker’s
negative attitude either toward the proposition or toward the speech act,
representing two types of modality: sentence modality and discourse modality. This, however, does not run counter to Ono and Suzuki’s contention that
the function of TE SIMAW- has been extended from semantics to pragmatics
— the direction discussed by Traugott (1982), Sweetser (1990), and Traugott
and König (1991), inter alia. In the case of TE SIMAW-, I would propose that
the modality of regret/surprise is to be derived from the semantic content of
the construction, viz. perfective and nonagentive.
2.6.
Obligatory Modality Interpretation
2.6.1.
Punctual Achievements
Three concepts can be expressed by TE SIMAW-: perfectivity, non-agentivity,
and modality of regret or surprise. If the TE-predicate itself is already perfective and nonagentive, the resultant complex nucleus can only be construed
as a modality expression. Punctual achievements are perfective and, being
inchoative, are nonagentive; predictably, when combined with TE SIMAWthey form modality expressions, e.g. (9).
(9) TE-predicate: punctual achievement (perfective, nonagentive)
a.zyoon
ga
siken ni
ukatte
simatta.
examLOC pass-TE put-PST
‘Joan passed the exam, to my regret/surprise.’ (Sentence Modality)
NOM
b. zyoon
ga
hon o
nakusite simatta.
book ACC lose-TE put-PST
‘Joan lost the book, to my regret/surprise.’
(Sentence Modality)
NOM
c.watasi wa siken ni
ukatte
simatta.
I
TOP examLOC
pass-TE put-PST
‘(I hesitate to say this, but) I passed the exam.’
(Discourse Modality)
2.6.2.
Statives
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Statives are nonagentive, and they cannot be perfective. In general, TE
SIMAW- does not accommodate stative TE-predicates, but when it does, it
functions as a modality expression (and not as a perfective), e.g. (10).
(10)
TE-predicate: stative (imperfective, nonagentive)
a.onaka ga
miete
simatta.
belly
NOM be.visible-TE
put-PST
‘My belly was showing, to my embarrassment.’
b. tyotto ooki-sugite simatta.
a.little too.big-TE put-PST
‘It’s a little too big, I’m afraid.’
2.7.
(Morita 1980)
Obligatory Absence of Modality Interpretation
The modality concepts regret and surprise force the interpreter to regard the
target proposition as factual (in the sense of §2.4). Therefore, TE SIMAWcannot be a modality expression in nonfactual contexts, (11), where it rather
conveys a perfective nuance.
(11) a.hon o
kaesite
simaoo.
book ACC return-TE put-PROV
‘(I) intend to return the book.’
b. hon o
kaesite
simau
rasii.
book ACC return-TE put-NPST EVID-NPST
‘(S/He) seems to be returning the book.’
‘It seems that (s/he) will return the book.’
c.waratte simaeba
umaku gomakaseru.
smile-TE put-COND well
can.cover.up
‘If (you respond with a) smile, (you) can cover up well.’
As mentioned above, if the TE-predicate is inherently perfective and
nonagentive, a modality interpretation is obligatory; on the other hand, nonfactual contexts do not allow modality interpretations. Therefore, an inherently perfective and nonagentive TE-predicate in a nonfactual context results
in anomaly, e.g. (12).
(12)
TE-predicate: punctual achievement (perfective, nonagentive)
Context: nonfactual
#kono
kuriimu
o
tukau to kizuato ga
kiete
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
79
this cream
ACC
use
if scar
NOM vanish-TE
simau
soo
da.
put-NPST EVID COP-NPST
‘I heard that if (I) use this cream, scars will disappear, to my
surprise.’
[intended]
2.8.
Interpretation of Accomplishments
Accomplishments are inherently perfective and generally agentive, e.g. otos‘drop’ (transitive) and koros- ‘kill’. If the TE-predicate is an accomplishment,
three possible interpretations emerge: TE SIMAW- may indicate nonagentivity, or modality, or both, as shown in (13).
(13) a.zyoon
ga
kabin o
watte
simatta.
vase
ACC
break-TE put-PST
‘Joan (unintentionally) broke the vase.’
‘Joan broke the vase, to my regret.’
‘Joan (unintentionally) broke the vase, to my regret.’
NOM
kite
simatta.12
NOM come-TE put-PST
‘Joan (unintentionally) came.’
‘Joan came, to my regret.’
‘Joan (unintentionally) came, to my regret.’
b. zyoon
2.9.
ga
TE-Predicates Which Permit [±Perfective]
Most Japanese activity verbs ([–perfective]) have their accomplishment
counterpart ([+perfective]), and are thus ambiguous with respect to perfectivity. If the TE-predicate is such a verb, in principle seven interpretations are
possible, as illustrated in (14). Some of these interpretations are difficult, but
none are impossible.13
12 K- ‘come’, which appears in (13b), has two Logical Structures ( LS’s): an
achievement LS, BECOME be-at´(x,y), and an accomplishment LS, DO [do´(x,)]
CAUSE [BECOME be-at´(y,x)]. The achievement k- accommodates nonanimate
subjects; the accomplishment k-, only animate subjects. Ik- ‘go’, on the other hand,
has only an accomplishment LS.
13 Japanese korae- ‘endure (e.g. pain)’ is much more clearly agentive than any ob-
vious English equivalent. As an approximation in (14a-g), I render the agentive
80
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(14)
zyoon
wa
TOP
itami o
pain ACC
koraete
withstand-TE
simatta.
put-PST
a.[+perfective]
‘Joan has survived the pain. (It doesn’t hurt any longer.)’
b. [–agentive]
‘Joan bore the pain (passively endured, without doing anything
about it; she is still enduring the pain).’
c.[+modality]
‘Joan withstood the pain, to my surprise. (I don’t know if she still
has pain.)’
d. [+perfective, –agentive]
‘Joan has borne and survived the pain (passively endured; but she
doesn’t have pain any longer).’
e.[+perfective, +modality]
‘Joan has survived the pain, to my surprise. (It doesn’t hurt any
longer.)’
f. [–agentive, +modality]
‘Joan bore the pain (passively), to my surprise. (She still has the
pain.)’
g. [+perfective, –agentive, +modality]
‘Joan has borne the pain and survived it, to my surprise. (She
doesn’t have the pain any longer.)’
The following formula sums up these possibilities:
(([+perfective] or [-agentive]) and [±modality]) or [+modality]
2.10. How Many TE SIMAW- Constructions?
In Chapter 1 §5 I argued that for an adequate description of TE-linkage, it is
necessary to posit a grammatical entity which consists of a pairing of a syntactic pattern with a meaning structure. The term construction has traditionally been used to refer to a syntactic pattern alone, but in this book it
always denotes such a pairing.
It has been demonstrated in the previous subsections that TE SIMAWcan indicate perfectivity, nonagentivity, and/or modality. Are there, then,
notion as ‘withstand’, the perfective notion as ‘survive’, and the nonagentive
notion as ‘bear (passively)’.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
81
three distinct TE SIMAW- constructions rather than one? The answer is ‘No.’
Although each semantic aspect can be isolated and some sentences permit
only one of them, many sentences realize various combinations of the three
(as seen in (14)). If there were three distinct constructions (i.e. SYN1+SEM1,
SYN1+SEM2, SYN1+SEM3), a given sentence would have to be an instantiation of just one of them, thus excluding the simultaneous presence of more
than one semantic aspect. (This, of course, does not exclude ambiguity: the
sentence might be interpreted in more than one way.) However, the data
indicate the contrary: co-occurrence of more than one semantic aspect is
frequently observed. Therefore, I conclude that there is only one TE SIMAWconstruction.
In principle, TE SIMAW- indicates all three semantic aspects at once,
and I will take this interpretation as the default or the unmarked case. Consequently, prototypical examples of TE SIMAW- will be those which permit
this default interpretation, e.g. (15).14
(15)
ukkari
kabin o
watte
simatta.
absent-mindedly vase
ACC
break-TE put-PST
‘(I) absent-mindedly broke the vase, to my regret.’
Some semantic aspects will be excluded from the set of possible interpretations if the TE-predicate itself is perfective or nonagentive, or if the context is
nonfactual. Let us consider, for example, the anomaly of (16).
(16)
#zyoon
ga
ikiteiru aida ni sain
o
alive
while signature ACC
morawa-nai-de simatta.
obtain-NEG-TE put-PST
‘I regret that I didn’t obtain her signature while Joan was still
alive.’
NOM
The negated TE-predicate morawa-nai-de in (16) cannot by its very nature be
perfective. Therefore, as with statives, the use of TE SIMAW- is awkward. In
such a case, the greater the regret, the higher the acceptability. Some may
consider (16) ungrammatical, but similar sentences can nonetheless be observed in natural speech.
The properties of TE SIMAW- are summarized as follows.
TE SIMAW- CONSTRUCTION
14 This claim is in accordance with the ‘textbook generalization’, i.e., textbooks of
Japanese do provide this default interpretation as the use of TE SIMAW-.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Syntax:
Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: The complex nucleus is perfective and/or nonagentive.
Pragmatics: The speaker regrets or is surprised at the situation denoted
by the clause.
3.
TE AR- CONSTRUCTIONS
3.1.
Verbs of Existence
There are two verbs of existence in Japanese: ar- and i-. Ar- is canonically
selected when the existent entity (i.e. the referent of the subject marked in the
nominative ga) is inanimate, and i- when it is animate, e.g. (17).
(17) a.asoko
ni
kuruma ga
{aru/*iru}
over.there LOC car
NOM
be-NPST
‘There is a car over there.’
b. asoko
ni
kodomo ga
over.there LOC child
NOM
‘There is a child over there.’
{*aru/iru}.
be-NPST
Both verbs are polysemous; semantically, each has two distinct Logical
Structures: be-at´, and have´. With the ‘have’ reading, the possessed entity
takes the nominative; the possessor is typically suppressed or marked by wa,
though it too may take the nominative. Note the curious fact that the possessed NP of i- ‘have’ can never be inanimate, whereas that of ar- ‘have’ may
sometimes be animate; contrast (18a) and (18b).
(18) a.zyoon {wa/ga}
tookyoo ni
ie
ga
{*iru/aru}.
TOP/NOM
LOC
house NOM
be-NPST
‘Joan has a house in Tokyo.’
b. zyoon {wa/ga} tookyoo ni
TOP/NOM
LOC
‘Joan has a relative in Tokyo.’
sinseki
ga
relatives NOM
{iru/aru}.
be-NPST
Further, when the location in locational readings is metaphorical, ar- can
again be used with animate entities, as shown in (19).
(19) a.zyoon
{wa/ga}
zetuboo
no
donzoko ni
TOP/NOM desperation GEN
bottom LOC
{iru/aru}.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
83
be-NPST
‘Joan is in the depths of despair.’
b. zyoon
{wa/ga}
koohuku
no
zettyoo ni {iru/aru}.
TOP/NOM happiness GEN
peak
LOC be-NPST
‘Joan is at the peak of happiness (Joan is in seventh heaven).’
Both verbs can appear in nuclear juncture, but TE AR- constructions are
structurally more complex than TE I-. Semantically, on the other hand, TE Iconstructions are far more complex than TE AR-. In this book, I will focus on
TE AR-, discussing TE I- only in passing.
3.2.
Valence-Maintaining vs. Valence-Changing Construction
There are two types of TE AR- constructions: (i) one in which the valence of
the TE-predicate is maintained, and (ii) one in which the valence of the
TE-predicate is altered in such a way that the actor (subject) is suppressed and
the undergoer (direct object) is marked in the nominative. For example, in
pattern (i) the undergoer of the transitive verb tome- ‘stop’ is marked in the
accusative in (20a), just as in (20b) without ar-. Note that the TE-predicate
can be intransitive in this pattern, e.g. (20c).
(20) a.(zyoon ga)
NOM
soto
ni kuruma o
tomete ar-u.
outside LOC car
ACC
stop-TE
be-NPST
‘(Joan) has parked the car outside.’
b. (zyoon ga)
soto
ni
kuruma o
tome-ta.
outside LOC car
ACC
stop-PST
‘(Joan) parked the car outside.’
NOM
c.(watasiwa) takusan nete
ar-u
wa yo.
I
TOP a lot
sleep-TE be-NPST PRT PRT
‘(I)’ve slept a lot.’
Contrast the change in valence in the second pattern. In (21) the undergoer kuruma ‘car’ is marked in the nominative, and the actor zyoon cannot
appear at all.
(21) (*zyoon
ga)
soto
ni kuruma ga
tomete ar-u.
outside LOC car
NOM stop-TE be-NPST
‘There is a car parked outside.’
NOM
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
I will call these two types the Valence-Maintaining TE AR- Construction,
(20), and the Valence-Changing TE AR- Construction, (21), and abbreviate
them as V-M and V-C, respectively.15
3.3.
Nuclear Subordination vs. Nuclear Coordination
Because only a small number of particles can intervene between the
TE-predicate and ar-, and the TE-predicate can be negated by nai-de (nuclear-level negative operator) but not naku-te (core-level negative operator), the
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
ARG
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
NP
PRED
zyoon ga soto ni kuruma o
tomete
ar-
NUC
ASP
u
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
‘Joan has parked the car outside.’ (= 20a)
FIGURE 3: Nuclear Subordination in the V-M Construction
juncture in the TE AR- pattern is determined to be at the nuclear level. In V-M,
the valence of the complex nucleus ‘V-te ar-’ is identical with that of the
TE-predicate itself, and the animacy restriction of ar- does not apply. That is,
ar- makes no contribution to the argument structure. 16 As with the TE
SIMAW- construction, therefore, the nexus type is determined to be subordination. Figure 3 illustrates this nuclear subordination of V-M.
In V-C, by contrast, the TE-predicate and ar- will be linked in
[–embedded] nuclear juncture, specifying their core argument(s) jointly. The
15 Martin (1975) refers to V-M as possessive resultative, and V-C as intransitivizing
resultative.
16 Loss of selectional restriction is common in nuclear subordination. In Lakhota, for
example, when the verb corresponding to ‘stand’ is predicative of an animate subject,
nãzi ‘stand (animate)’ must be used instead of hã ‘stand (inanimate)’, as in lowã
nãzi/*lowã hã ‘He stands singing’. By contrast, when the verb is used in nuclear
subordination to indicate progressive aspect, the inanimate hã must be used regardless of the animacy of the subject, lowã hã ‘He is singing’. (Robert Van Valin, p.c.).
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
85
nexus is determined to be coordination rather than cosubordination because it
is possible to negate just the first predicate in V-C, by using the nuclear negative operator nai-de. Sentence (22) and Figure 4 illustrate this linkage type.
(22)
Valence-Changing TE AR- Construction
tegami ga
dasa- nai-de
ar-u.
(Figure 4)
letter
NOM send NEG-TE
be-NPST
‘There is a letter which hasn’t been sent out.’
Although V-M occurs more frequently than V-C (NLRI 1964), V-C has
CLAUSE
CORE
NUC
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
PRED
PRED
tegami ga dasa-
nai-de
ar-
NUC
NEG
NUC
u
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 4: Nuclear Coordination in the V-C Construction
received greater attention in the linguistic literature because it poses fundamental problems for syntactic theories. Most current syntactic theories consider all processes which change grammatical functions (e.g. passives and
causatives in Japanese) to be lexical. However, as discussed in §1.1 of this
chapter, a ‘V-TE V’ sequence cannot be a lexical unit, and therefore the
change in grammatical function must be accounted for as part of the syntax of
V-C.
3.4.
Argument Selection in Nuclear Coordination: Macroroles
In nuclear coordination, two predicates, each of which has its own inherent
argument structure (Logical Structure, LS), are linked together to form a
single nucleus. Although complex, such a nucleus can only have a single set
of core arguments. The question, then, arises as to which particular entities in
the LSs of the linked predicates are to be realized as core arguments of the
complex nucleus. In order to discuss this issue, I will utilize another concept
of RRG, viz. macroroles, which was introduced in Chapter 2 §6.3.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Given the LS representation of predicates, the selection of the core arguments is highly predictable. RRG recognizes six thematic relations —
AGENT, EFFECTOR, EXPERIENCER, LOCATIVE, THEME, and PATIENT.
These thematic relations are defined according to (i) their position in a verb’s
LS and (ii) Aktionsart of the verb, as restated in (23, 24) ((28), (29) of Chapter
2).
(23)
A.
B.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
STATES
Locational:
be-at´(x,y)
Non-Locational:
State or condition: broken´(x)
Perception:
see´(x,y)
Cognition:
believe´(x,y)
Possession:
have´(x,y)
Equational:
be´(x,y)
(24) ACTIVITIES
A. Uncontrolled:
1. Non-motion:
2. Motion:
B. Controlled:
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
x=PATIENT
x=EXPERIENCER, y=THEME
x=EXPERIENCER, y=THEME
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
x=LOCATIVE, y=THEME
do´(x, [cry´(x)])
do´(x, [learn´(x,y)])
roll´(x)
DO [do´(x, [run´(x)])]
x=EFFECTOR
x=EFFECTOR,
y=LOCATIVE
x=THEME
x=AGENT
Among these six thematic relations, at most two are selected by any given
predicate to be special core arguments. Those two relations — or macroroles
(MRs) — are the actor and undergoer. We will shortly turn to the question of
determining, in any given case, which thematic relations are chosen as actor
and undergoer.
The number of MRs that a given predicate may take is either 0 (e.g.
samu- ‘be cold (weather)’), 1 (e.g. nak- ‘cry’), or 2 (e.g. yom- ‘read’), according to the default principle in (25).
(25)
GENERAL MACROROLE ASSIGNMENT PRINCIPLE I
(Van Valin 1990:227)
The number of MRs a verb takes is less than or equal to the
number of arguments in its LS.
a.If a verb has two or more arguments in its LS, it will take two
MRs.
b. If a verb has one argument in its LS, it will take one MR.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
87
If the number of LS arguments and the number of MRs fail to match, the
number of MR(s) must be specified in the lexical entry of the predicate. For
verbs which take one MR, the following rule determines which MR is selected.
Actor
Undergoer
AGENT EFFECTOR EXPERIENCER LOCATIVE THEME PATIENT
SOURCE PATH GOAL RECIPIENT
FIGURE 5: Actor-Undergoer Hierarchy in RRG
(26)
GENERAL MACROROLE ASSIGNMENT PRINCIPLE II
(Van Valin 1990:227)
a.If the verb has an activity predicate in its LS, the MR is actor.
b. If the verb has no activity predicate in its LS, the MR is undergoer.
Prototypically, the actor is an AGENT and the undergoer a PATIENT.
More generally, these MRs are determined according to the Actor-Undergoer
Hierarchy shown in Figure 5 (= Figure 25 of Chapter 2).17 (Arrows indicate
increasing markedness of realization of the given thematic relation as macro-role.) Thus, if there is an agent present, it will normally be selected as
actor; otherwise, an effector will be chosen; otherwise, an experiencer; etc.
Similarly, but in the reverse direction, for undergoer.
As discussed in the preceding section, the V-C construction is intransitive, i.e., it does not permit an accusative NP — in RRG terms, it has only one
MR. This intransitivizing process is considered to be an operation on LSs.
Consider (27) by way of example.
(27)
yasai
ga
kitte
ar-u.
vegetable NOM chop-TE be-NPST
‘There are vegetables being chopped.’
17 K. Inoue (1989) proposes a similar hierarchy for subject selection in Japanese, viz.
(from highest to lowest) AGENT, EXPERIENCER, SOURCE, GOAL, OBJECTIVE
(taisyoogo), CAUSE, INSTRUMENTAL, LOCATIVE.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
The two coordinated predicates in (27) have the following LSs.18
kir-
ar-
‘chop’
[do´(x,Ø)] CAUSE [BECOME chopped´(y)];
x=AGENT; y=PATIENT
‘exist, be’ be-at´(x,y); x=LOCATIVE; y=THEME
When ar- appears with nuclear coordination, the resultant complex nucleus
takes only one MR. This particular intransitivizing process can be represented as:
[do´(x,Ø)] CAUSE [BECOME pred´(y)]  pred´(y)
When applied to kir- ‘chop’, this process yields:
[do´(x,Ø)] CAUSE [BECOME chopped´(y)]  chopped´(y)
However, the resultant LS fails to capture the fact that (27) is also formally a
locative existential sentence, though the locative is not overtly present. This
fact can be formalized by stipulating that the LS of ar- should have two alternatives:
ar-
‘exist, be’
be-at´(x,y)
be-at´ (x, [LS])
x=LOCATIVE; y=THEME
x=LOCATIVE)
The overall LS of the V-C construction with kir- will then be gotten by combining the two component LSs:
kitte ar-:
be-at´ (x, [chopped´(y)])
This is exactly what sentence (27) indicates. To sum up, V-C must be specified syntactically as:
TE-predicate:
ar-:
[do´(x,Ø)] CAUSE [BECOME pred´(y)]  pred´(y)
be-at´ (x, [LS])
Note that V-C changes the valence of the TE-predicate in two ways: it removes
the actor, but at the same time it adds a ni-locative.
3.5.
Perfect vs. Resultative
18 The verb kir- ‘cut, chop’ is agentive, and thus has DO in its LS, i.e. DO [do´(x,)]
CAUSE [BECOME chopped´(y)]; however, the agentivity is irrelevant to the issue at
hand, and thus has not been included in the discussion. Note also that ar- as main
predicate has two entities, a LOCATIVE and a THEME. Only the THEME, however,
receives MR status, while the LOCATIVE is marked by ni.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
89
Sentences involving the ‘V-te ar-’ pattern have uniformly been analyzed as
resultatives, and no question has been raised as to whether they are appropriately categorized as such. In this section it is argued that while the V-C
construction is indeed properly categorized as a resultative, and the TE Iconstruction as a perfect, V-M exhibits properties of both the resultative and
the perfect.19
According to Comrie (1976), the perfect indicates the continuing present relevance of a past situation; and the resultative, which indicates both a
state and a preceding event (i.e. action or process) from which it has resulted,
is the clearest manifestation of the perfect.20 With this definition, all resultatives are perfects, whereas the perfect can be resultative or nonresultative.
Surveying resultatives in the world’s languages, Nedjalkov and
Jaxontov (1988) specify the following general characteristics of perfect and
resultative constructions.
(28) a. While the aftereffects of the action expressed by the perfect are
non-specific, the resultative expresses a resultant state of a specific
participant.
b. The perfect, unlike the resultative, can be derived from any verb,
whether transitive or intransitive, telic or atelic, including verbs that
denote situations which involve no change in the state of any participant, e.g. the verbs corresponding to sing and laugh.
c. The perfect does not alter the valence of the base verb, whereas the
resultative is predominantly intransitive.
d. If adverbials of duration co-occur with the perfect, they denote
duration of the event; if they co-occur with the resultative, they express duration of the resultant state.
e. If adverbials of moment co-occur with the perfect, they denote the
moment at which the event takes place, whereas with the resultative,
they denote only a moment at which the state is in existence.
f. Resultatives of verbs of motion can collocate with adverbials which
do not occur with the base verb alone, whereas the perfect does not
allow such a collocation.
It will be instructive to apply these criteria to the TE AR- and TE I- construc19 In this book, the term perfect is used to refer solely to the present perfect. The
future perfect and the pluperfect exhibit different characteristics from the present
perfect.
20 We will refine this definition shortly.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
tions. We shall see that, according to (28a-e), the V-M and TE I- constructions
are to be categorized as perfect, and the V-C construction as resultative.
However, according to (28f), V-M, but not TE I-, may be categorized as
resultative as well.
Regarding (28a), first of all, the aftereffects expressed by the V-C construction are indeed more specific than with the V-M or the TE I- construction.
For example, (29a) (V-M/TE I-) can be a statement either about Joan’s past
action or about the present state of the car, while (29b) ( V-C) can only be a
statement about the car.
(20) a.(zyoon ga)
NOM
soto
ni
kuruma o
tomete
outside LOC car
ACC
stop-TE
{ar-u/i-ru}.
be-NPST
‘(Joan) has parked the car outside.’
b. (*zyoon
ga)
NOM
soto
ni
kuruma ga
tomete
outside LOC car
NOM stop-TE
ar-u.
be-NPST
‘There is a car parked outside.’
This difference in specificity of aftereffects is partly due to (28c): V-C is
necessarily intransitive, as befits its status as a resultative; and by consistently
suppressing the actor, V-C automatically constrains any ‘after-effects’ to
apply specifically to the undergoer. V-M and TE I-, on the other hand, are
subject to no such transitivity constraint.
With regard to the range of possible base verbs (28b), it has already
been mentioned that V-M accommodates not only transitive verbs but also
intransitives, e.g. (20c). This is also valid for the TE I- construction. V-C, on
the other hand, permits only transitive base verbs expressing some event
which can result in a visible state of the object.21 Sentence (30) is anomalous
because knocking on a door usually does not leave any visible traces.
21 Miyagawa (1989) claims that the V-C construction provides an independent and
objective test for themehood, however the latter is defined — i.e., only those verbs
which can appear in this construction assign the theme role to their object NP.
However, such a claim is untenable. As Y. Matsumoto (1990a) and Fukushima
(1991) convincingly argue, the acceptability of sentences with V-C depends on
pragmatics rather than on any particular semantic role that the base verb assigns to its
object.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
(30)
91
# doa ga
tataite
aru.
(Y. Matsumoto 1990a)
door NOM beat-TE be-NPST
‘The door is in the state of having been knocked upon.’
[intended]
When adverbials of duration co-occur with a TE AR- or TE I- (28d), they
denote the duration of the event with V-M (31a) and TE I- (31b) [the contrast
between V-M and TE I- will be explained shortly], but the duration of the
resultant state with V-C, e.g. (31c). (31d) is awkward because it involves
V-M/TE I-, and therefore san zikan ‘three hours’ is construed as the duration
of the event, even though tuke- ‘turn on’ is not a durative verb but a punctual
one.
(31) a.watasi wa
zyuugo
I
TOP
15
‘I’ve slept 15 hours.’
zikan nete
{aru/#iru}.
hours sleep-TE be-NPST
(V-M)
b. zyoon wa
zyuugo zikan nete
{#aru/iru}.
Joan
TOP
15
hours sleep-TE be-NPST
‘Joan has slept 15 hours.’
(TE I-)
c.denki ga
san zikan tukete
aru.
light
NOM 3
hours turn-on-TE be-NPST
‘The light has been (turned) on for 3 hours.’ (V-C)
d. ?denki o
san zikan tukete
{aru/iru}.
light ACC 3
hours turn-on-TE be-NPST
‘(I)’ve turned on the light for 3 hours.’
[intended]
(V-M/TE I-)
The adverbials in the following V-M/TE I- sentences appear to be
counterexamples, i.e., they appear to denote the duration of the resultant state.
(32) a.kuruma o
san zikan tomete {aru/iru}.
car
ACC
3
hours stop-TE be-NPST
Lit. ‘The car has been stopped for 3 hours.’
‘The car has been parked for 3 hours.’
b. biiru o
reezooko
ni
san zikan irete
beer ACC refrigerator LOC 3
hours put-TE
{aru/iru}.
be-NPST
‘(I/Someone) put the beer in the refrigerator for 3 hours.’
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
However, these verbs are actually polysemous, for tome- ‘stop’ and ire- ‘put’,
though basically punctual, can metonymically indicate a continuing state
ensuing from the initial action, e.g. ‘park’ instead of ‘stop’, and ‘keep’ instead
of ‘put’. The proof is the fact that in (33a, b), no TE-linkage is involved, and
yet the same adverbials of duration occur; this demonstrates that tome- and
ire- are not being used as punctual verbs in (33), and hence not in (32) either.
(33) a.san zikan tomemasu.
3
hours stop(POL)-NPST
‘(I)’ll park (it) for 3 hours.’
b. san zikan reezooko
ni
iremasu.
3
hours refrigerator LOC put(POL)-NPST
‘(I)’ll keep (it) in the refrigerator for three hours.’
In cases where a punctual TE-predicate cannot metonymically refer to a resultant continuing state, e.g. tuk- ‘arrive’ and oe- ‘finish’ (VT), the collocation
of durative adverbials and V-M/TE I- is anomalous and unacceptable.
(34) a.*san zikan tuite
{aru/iru}.
3
hours arrive-TE
be-NPST
‘(I) arrived (and have been here) for three hours.’
[intended]
b. *kaigi
o
san zikan oete
{aru/iru}.
meeting ACC 3
hours finish-TE be-NPST
‘(I) ended the meeting three hours ago.’
[intended]
When adverbials of moment co-occur with a TE AR- construction (28e),
they denote the time at which the event took place with V-M/TE I-, e.g.
(35a,b), and a time at which the resultant state is in existence with V-C, e.g.
(35c).22 Notice that the tense (past) is in accordance with the adverbial kinoo
‘yesterday’ in (35c), whereas the tense is nonpast in (35a,b).
(35) a.watasi wa
kinoo
kippu o
katte
{aru/#iru}.
I
TOP
yesterday ticket ACC buy-TE be-NPST
‘I bought a ticket yesterday (and this fact is relevant to the
current discourse).’
(V-M)
22 The HAVE -EN perfect pattern in English cannot collocate with moment adverbials
that denote a single event time: *‘I’ve read the book yesterday.’ It can collocate with
cyclic moment adverbials, e.g. Sunday, but only when it is construed as the so-called
experiential perfect: ‘All my life I’ve gone to church on Sunday.’ See McCawley
(1971) and Michaelis (1991) for further discussion.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
93
b. zyoon wa
kinoo
kippu o
katte
{#aru/iru}.
Joan
TOP
yesterday ticket ACC buy-TE
be-NPST
‘Joan bought a ticket yesterday (and this fact is relevant to the
current discourse).’
(TE I-)
c.kippu ga
kinoo
katte
{atta/*aru}.
ticket NOM yesterday buy-TE be-PST/be-NPST
Lit. ‘Yesterday there was a ticket bought.’ (V-C)
According to Nedjalkov and Jaxontov’s criteria (28a-e), then, the V-M
and TE I- constructions are more appropriately categorized as perfect than as
resultative. It remains to consider their final criterion, (28f). But first a
digression is necessary regarding the perfect TE I- construction and the differences between it and V-M, as observable in (31a,b) and (35a,b). The
crucial fact is that V-M describes situations subjectively, whereas TE I- does
so objectively. The essential quality of subjective description is the speaker’s
‘insider’ stance to the actor in the described event — typically (but not necessarily) with first-person subjects, where actor and speaker are the same
person.23 V-M with third-person subject implies that the speaker considers
the referent of the subject to be an insider, so that it is appropriate to state
his/her action subjectively. In (36a), by contrast, sono otoko ‘that man’
cannot involve ‘insider’ reference to the subject, and thus the sentence with
AR- (V-M) is anomalous. (36b) with I- is anomalous for the inverse reason:
because subjective description is the default when the speaker describes
his/her own past actions.24
(36) a.sono
otoko wa
tanaka
ni
wairo o
watasite
23 Prototypical examples of objective description are descriptions of natural events,
e.g. earthquake, typhoon, or change of season. The most salient examples of subjective description are when the speaker describes his/her own actions; here the
speaker knows that the actor (=himself/herself) performed or intends to perform the
described action. However, knowledge of the actor’s intention is not in itself a sufficient condition for the speaker to describe the action subjectively. In order to
consider himself/herself entitled to make a subjective description, the speaker must
consider the actor an insider. See Wetzel (1984, 1985) and Tokunaga (1986) for the
insider-outsider distinction in Japanese.
24 Two kinds of subjectivity are involved in perfect constructions in Japanese. First,
the question of whether or not the past event is relevant to the current discourse is a
subjective judgment, a consideration which applies equally to both the V-M and the
TE I- construction. The point at issue here, however, concerns how to describe the
event itself. With V-M the event is described subjectively, with TE I- objectively.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
that man TOP
LOC
bribe ACC
{#aru/iru}.
be-NPST
‘The man has given a bribe to Tanaka.’
b. watasi wa tanaka ni
wairo o
I
TOP
LOC
bribe ACC
‘I’ve given a bribe to Tanaka.’
give-TE
watasite {aru/#iru}.
give-TE be-NPST
Returning now to the characteristics of the perfect and the resultative
proposed by Nedjalkov and Jaxontov, we observe (28f) that V-C can collocate
with a ni-marked locative that is not permitted by the TE-predicate, a collocation which is not possible with the perfect. In other words, V-C adds a
valence participant, as shown in (37a´,b´). In (37a), the ni-locative, reezooko
no naka ni ‘in the refrigerator’ cannot directly collocate with kaw- ‘buy’; but
the collocation is possible when kaw- is the TE-predicate of V-C, as in (37a´).
(37) a.*reezooko
no
naka
ni
gyuunyuu
refrigerator GEN inside LOC milk
[uninterpretable]
a´.
ACC
reezooko
no naka
ni gyuunyuu ga
refrigerator GEN inside LOC milk
NOM
aru.
be-NPST
Lit. ‘Milk is bought in the refrigerator.’
‘Milk has been bought and is in the refrigerator.’
b. *genkan
ni
entrance-hall LOC
b´.
o
kutu o
shoe ACC
katta.
bought
katte
buy-TE
migaita.
polished [uninterpretable]
genkan
ni
kutu ga
migaite
aru.
entrance-hall LOC shoe NOM
polish-TE be-NPST
Lit. ‘Shoes are polished in the entrance hall.’
‘Shoes have been polished and are in the entrance hall.’
Note, however, that in V-M a collocation with a ni-locative is also possible,
although less natural than in V-C. In the perfect TE I- construction, by contrast, such a collocation is excluded. Thus:
(38) a.reezooko
no
naka
ni
gyuunyuu
refrigerator GEN inside LOC milk
{aru/*iru}.
o
ACC
katte
buy-TE
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
95
be-NPST
‘(I) bought milk, and it is in the refrigerator.’
b. genkan
ni
kutu o
migaite
{aru/*iru}.
entrance.hall LOC shoe ACC polish-TE
be-NPST
‘(I) polished the shoes, and they are in the entrance hall.’
The sentences in (38) demonstrate that the V-M construction does share one
property of resultatives, viz. increasing the valence of the base verb (28f).
The fact that when adverbials of moment co-occur with V-M, they denote the time at which the event took place, e.g. (39a), has already been
mentioned (recall 35a). Such adverbials, however, cannot co-occur with V-M
if there is a ni-locative which was not in the TE-predicate’s original valence
(39b).
(39) a.kinoo
gyuunyuu o
katte
aru
kara
yesterday milk
ACC
buy-TE be-NPST because
kyoo wa
kawa-nai-de.
today TOP buy-NEG-TE
‘(I) bought milk yesterday, so don’t buy (any) today.’
b. *reezooko
no
naka
ni
kinoo
gyuunyuu
refrigerator GEN inside LOC yesterday milk
o
katte
aru
kara
kyoo wa
kawa-nai-de.
ACC buy-TE be-NPST because today TOP
buy-NEG-TE
‘(I) bought milk yesterday, and it is in the refrigerator, so don’t
buy (any) today.’
[intended]
These sentences display an interesting pattern regarding the distribution of
ni-locatives and moment adverbials, correlating with the dual interpretation
of V-M as asserting a process and/or a resultant state. If the V-M construction
is understood to be perfect, it can co-occur with a moment adverbial denoting
the event time, but not with a ni-locative (39b). If, on the other hand, the V-M
construction is understood as resultative, it can co-occur with a ni-locative
(specifying the location of the resultant state) (38a), but not with a moment
adverbial denoting the event time (39b). These inverse co-occurrence restrictions bring out strongly the ambiguity of V-M with respect to the perfect-resultative distinction.
3.6.
Monovalent-Nonlocational vs. Bivalent-Locational Resultative
Nedjalkov and Jaxontov recognize two semantic types of resultatives: spe-
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
cific resultative and general resultative. In the specific resultative, the visual
state of an entity allows the observer to transparently deduce the particular
event that must have brought that state about, e.g. tied, cooked. In the general
resultative, by contrast, the resultant state of an entity is described less immediately, through an event the speaker has witnessed or deduced indirectly,
e.g. killed, stolen. There are two kinds of specific resultatives: monovalent-nonlocational (monovalent for short), i.e. X has a visible property P (e.g.
cooked, broken), and bivalent-locational, i.e. X is located in a specific way
with respect to Y (e.g. attached to, enclosed in). The latter is bivalent because
it involves two entities, LOCATIVE and THEME. Nedjalkov and Jaxontov
propose the following implicational universal:25
general
bivalent  locational
 monovalent
resultative 
resultative
resultative
That is, if the general resultative exists in the language in question, so too does
the specific resultative; if the monovalent resultative is found, so too the
bivalent-locational. Kozinskij (1988) claims that the preference for specific
resultatives has to do with observability: states such as being dead, broken,
etc. are more observable than some other states, e.g. being killed or stolen.
But the preference for bivalent-locational over monovalent resultatives still
must be accounted for. If, Kozinskij notes, one were to consider location as
merely another of the visible properties, then the bivalent-locational would
appear to be more complex, and hence less easily observable, than the
monovalent. One might therefore have expected the implicational universal
to be:
general
 locational
 bivalent
 monovalent
resultative
resultative
resultative
To the contrary, however, Kozinskij argues that the bivalent-locational is
more observable than the monovalent. He observes that in this type both the
figure and the ground (in the sense of Talmy 1978a), and often their spatial
arrangement as well, are normally immediately observable; in the case of
‘The stamp is glued to the envelope,’ for example, no previous state need be
inferred, presupposed, or guessed. By contrast, in the monovalent, e.g. ‘The
window is broken,’ an alternative state of the same or a similar entity is
necessary as grounds for comparison. In such a case, the role of ground is
played by this alternative state, which is called the norm (Chafe 1976). Such
25 The notion A>B here means that if a language has an explicit means of expressing
A, it will also have an explicit means of expressing B.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
97
a ground, however, does not fall within the field of direct perception and
cannot be observed. Therefore, Kozinskij maintains, bivalent-locational
resultatives are more salient than monovalent resultatives. The more observable the situation, the higher the probability of the use of the resultative
— a thoroughly reasonable statement from the viewpoint of human cognition.
Both the V-C and the V-M construction can be bivalent-locational resultative. (Recall that both permit a ni-locative.) While V-M permits general
resultative interpretations, V-C allows only specific resultative interpretations; V-C is utilized only when the visual state of an entity allows the speaker
to deduce the particular event that has brought it about.26 However, V-C is
still ambiguous regarding the monovalent and bivalent-locational opposition,
as illustrated in (40, 41).
(40) a.ningyoo no
kubi ga
nuite
aru.
doll
GEN
head NOM
pull-out-TE be-NPST
‘A doll’s head has been pulled out (of its socket).’
(monovalent)
b. konpyuutaa no
modemu ga
hazusite
aru.
computer
GEN
modem NOM detach-TE be-NPST
‘The modem has been detached from the computer.’
(monovalent)
(41) a.ningyoo no
kubi ga
nuite
aru.
doll
GEN
head NOM pull.out-TE be-NPST
‘There (deictic) is a doll’s head which was pulled out (of its
socket).’
(bivalent)
b. konpyuutaa no
modemu ga
hazusite
aru.
computer
GEN
modem NOM detach-TE be-NPST
‘There (deictic) is a modem which was detached from the
computer.’
(bivalent)
Sentences with V-C are ambiguous when the subject contains a genitive NP
and the TE-predicate indicates detachment of some sort from the referent of
that NP. Thus, the construction can be used to describe either the state in
which a headless doll is present (monovalent nonlocational; the speaker
describes the state with respect to the norm of a headed doll), as in (40a), or
26 Katsuya Kinjo has brought to my attention some similarities between the distinc-
tion discussed here and the two Turkish past-tense morphemes, -di (direct experience)
and -mi (indirect experience). One of the uses of -di can be characterized as perfect,
and one of the uses of -mi as resultative. See Slobin and Aksu (1982) for details.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
the state in which the detached head of a doll is present but not the rest of the
doll (bivalent locational, even though the locative NP (the doll) is not overtly
present), as in (41a).27
The ni-locative may appear only with the bivalent locational resultative,
as shown in (42). That is, when the locative NP is overtly present, the
statement can only be about the doll’s head or only about the modem — not
about the headless doll or the computer without a modem.
(42) a.teeburu no
ue ni
ningyoo no
kubi ga
table
GEN
top LOC doll
GEN
head NOM
nuite
aru.
pull.out-TE be-NPST
‘There on the table is a doll’s head which was pulled out (of its
socket).’
b. teeburu
table
no
GEN
ue ni
top LOC
konpyuutaa
computer
no
GEN
modemu
modem
ga
hazusite
aru.
detach-TE be-NPST
‘There on the table is a modem which was detached from the
computer.’
NOM
3.7.
Assertion vs. Implication of the Past Event
Perfect and resultative are distinct in a crucial way. In truth-conditional terms
the perfect is equivalent to the simple, whereas the resultative is a stative in
which the preceding event is mentioned but its actual occurrence is not asserted. The truth-conditional equivalence of simple past and perfect is shown
27 In order to simplify discussion of these examples, I have labeled the first inter-
pretation ‘monovalent nonlocational resultative’, which involves a comparison between the current state of an entity and the norm, and the second ‘bivalent locational
resultative’, which does not require such a comparison. Strictly speaking, however,
the second interpretation also indicates that the speaker has either witnessed the
previous state or inferred it. The point at issue here is that in the bivalent locational
interpretation, the subject NP as a whole (containing two nouns) refers to a single
entity, just as it usually does; by contrast, in the monovalent nonlocational interpretation, the genitive NP alone has a referring function. This last feature is unique to the
V-C construction.
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
99
in (43): (43a) is equivalent to (43b) or (43c), depending on the subject.
However, because (43b,c) are perfect but (43a) is in the simple past, if
Tanaka’s or the speaker’s alibi is being discussed, (43b) or (43c) is more
appropriate than (43a).28
(43) a.{tanaka/watasi} wa san-zi
ni yamada
I
TOP 3.o’clock PRT
‘Tanaka/I visited Yamada at 3 o’clock.’
b. tanaka
o
ACC
tazuneta.
visited
wa
san-zi
ni yamada o
tazunete iru.
3.o’clock PRT
ACC
visit-TE be-NPST
‘Tanaka visited Yamada at 3 o’clock (and this fact is relevant to
the current discourse).’ (TE I- construction)
TOP
c.watasi wa san-zi
ni yamada o
tazunete aru.
I
TOP 3.o’clock PRT
ACC
visit-TE be-NPST
‘I visited Yamada at 3 o’clock (and this fact is relevant to the
current discourse).’
(V-M construction)
The perfect involves the notion of modality. The speaker considers that
the past event is relevant to the current discourse, but how it is relevant is not
specified. The modality-part of the sentence cannot be challenged by the
addressee(s), because only the speaker has the right to express her/his own
attitude toward what s/he says. While the addressee(s) can deny the proposition-part by uttering sore wa tigau ‘That’s not true’, s/he cannot deny the
intended relevance of the proposition to the current discourse simply by
denying the previous utterance as a whole.
The perfect (as expressed by TE I- below) frequently implicates a resultative state as the outcome of the event referred to by the TE-predicate. But
such a resultative reading is only an implicature, which can be cancelled
without yielding a contradiction.
(44) a.tanaka
wa
TOP
ni-nen mae
2.years ago
ni
PRT
sono
that
uti
house
o
ACC
katte
iru.
buy-TE be-NPST
‘Tanaka bought that house 2 years ago (and this fact is relevant).’
b. sikasi
kare
however he
wa
TOP
saikin
recently
kyuu-ni yamada
suddenly
ni
LOC
28 As mentioned above (§3.5), the use of i- (42b) indicates objective description, ar-
(42c) subjective description.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
uriharatta.
sold
‘However, recently he suddenly sold (it) to Yamada.’
Thus if only (44a) is heard, the natural interpretation is that Tanaka owns the
house at the time of utterance, i.e. a resultative state is implicated. However,
this implicature can readily be cancelled by (44b).
With the resultative, by contrast, the resultant state is asserted but the
previous event is not. The speaker presents the current state of an entity as the
resultant state of some enabling event which is assumed to have occurred to
the entity. The speaker may not be focusing on the enabling event per se at
all; s/he may not even know whether the enabling event really occurred, or
when. Thus one could say
(45)
mado
ga
akete
aru.
window NOM
open(TV)-TE be-NPST
‘The window is open(ed).’
even if one had not seen the window being opened, indeed even if the window
had been standing open for years. The enabling event is only assumed to have
occurred, and this assumption (implicature) is cancellable. Thus:
(46) a.#biiru ga
katte
aru;
sikasi nonde
simatta
beer NOM buy-TE be-NPST but
drink-TE finished
kara
moo
na-i.
because any.longer be-NEG-NPST
Lit. ‘There’s some beer bought; but because (I) drank it, there’s
no more.’
b. biiru ga
katte
aru;
moratta no
ka
beer NOM buy-TE be-NPST received NMLZ Q
sirenai
keredo.
can’t.know though
Lit. ‘There’s some beer bought; it may be a gift, though.’
mo
PRT
In (46a), the second clause denies the result of the buying, i.e. that there is
some beer — which yields a contradiction. In (46b), on the other hand, the
second clause does not deny the resultant state but only the mode of arriving
at it (the event of buying); and this sentence is not perceived as contradictory.29
29 Y. Matsumoto (1990a) claims that one condition on the V-C construction is that an
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
101
The V-M construction is distinct from V-C and from the perfect TE Iconstruction in that it asserts both the event and the resultant state. Thus both
of the following are anomalous:
(47) a.#zyoon ga
biiru o
katte
aru;
sikasi nonde
beer ACC buy-TE be-NPST but
drink-TE
simatta kara
moo
na-i.
finished because any.longer be-NEG-NPST
‘Joan has bought beer; but because (she) drank it, there’s no
more.’
NOM
b. #zyoon ga
biiru o
katte
aru;
moratta no
beer ACC buy-TE be-NPST received NMLZ
ka mo
sirenai
keredo.
Q PRT
can’t.know though
‘Joan has bought some beer; she might have been given it,
though.’
The asserted event itself is cancelled in (47b), and the asserted resultant state
in (47a), making both sentences anomalous.
What is peculiar to V-M is that although both the event and the resultant
state are asserted, only one of them can be singled out for further modification. As pointed out above, an adverbial of moment, which denotes the time
at which the event took place, cannot co-occur with a non-valence-bound
ni-locative, denoting the location of the relevant entity. For example, if
reezooko no naka ni ‘in the refrigerator’ is absent in (39a) V-M can accommodate kinoo ‘yesterday’, but not if the locative phrase is present. This
restriction suggests that the construction is ambiguous with respect to the
perfect-resultative opposition. On the other hand, the cancellability test
suggests that the construction is simultaneously both perfect and resultative.
It has been suggested that the perfect in many languages has developed
from the resultative diachronically (Jespersen 1924, Kuryowicz 1964,
Maslov 1988) as well as ontogenetically (Slobin and Aksu 1982). T.
Takahashi (1975), who investigated predicative forms in the speech of 305
children from ages 3.3 to 6.6, reports that the V-te ar- syntagm has already
been acquired even by the youngest group of children (ages 3.3 to 4.4).
However, because young children seldom use case particles, it is not always
clear which TE AR- construction they are using. Takahashi’s data include a
NOM
agent must have purposefully produced the situation being described by the V-C. I
maintain that neither the actual occurrence of the event nor the purposefulness of the
agent need be asserted.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
fair number of V-C sentences in all but the youngest group, but no occurrences
of V-M. It may be plausible, then, to consider that V-C is acquired prior to
V-M. However, although V-C (the resultative) may be more salient than V-M
(the resultative perfect) semantically, V-C is more complex than V-M syntactically, by virtue of changing the verb valence. This discrepancy awaits
further investigation.
The characteristics of the V-M and the V-C constructions are summarized below.
RESULTATIVE-PERFECT TE AR- CONSTRUCTION
(V-M Construction)
Syntax:
Nuclear Subordination
The argument structure of the TE-predicate is unchanged.
Semantics: The complex nucleus in the nonpast denotes both the past
situation and the present state of the entity affected by the
situation.
Pragmatics: The past situation is relevant to the current discourse.
RESULTATIVE TE AR- CONSTRUCTION (V-C Construction)
Syntax:
Nuclear Coordination
TE-predicate: [do´(x,Ø)] CAUSE [BECOME pred´(y)] 
pred´(y)
ar-: be-at´(x, [LS])
Semantics: The complex nucleus denotes the present state of the
entity.
Pragmatics: The event referred to by the TE-predicate is only
implicated, not asserted.
4.
SUMMARY
In this chapter, nuclear TE-linkage with simaw- ‘put’ and ar- ‘be’ has been
examined. The verb simaw- is linked with the TE-predicate in subordination,
and thus it does not affect the argument structure of the core; i.e., the argument structure is identical with that of the TE-predicate. Although the complex nucleus embodying the subordination is not a lexical unit, it nevertheless
exhibits similarities with lexical compounds because the subordinate predicate qualifies certain properties of the TE-predicate itself, with no attention to
its argument structure. Although three concepts — perfectivity, nonagentivity, and the speaker’s regret/surprise — are relevant to TE SIMAW-, there is
only a single TE SIMAW- construction. In prototypical usages, all three
Chapter 3: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part I
103
nuances are present; some may be absent in less typical instances.
Unlike simaw-, ar- is linked to the TE-predicate either in nuclear subordination (V-M) or in nuclear coordination (V-C); thus there are two syntactically distinct TE AR- constructions. Although there is no strict
one-to-one correspondence, V-M typically indicates perfect, and V-C resultative. The V-C and V-M constructions were examined in some detail with
respect to the perfect-resultative opposition. V-C displays all the diagnostic
characteristics of resultative typical of the world’s languages, whereas V-M
exhibits some characteristics of both perfect and resultative. V-M deviates
from the perfect TE I- construction in that (i) only V-M permits ni-locatives
which are not in the valence of the TE-predicate, and (ii) V-M asserts (i.e. does
not implicate) the state which results from an event referred to by the
TE-predicate.
CHAPTER 4
TE-LINKAGE WITH NUCLEAR JUNCTURE:
PART II
In Chapter 3, two nexus types of TE-linkage with nuclear juncture were
identified. The verb simaw- ‘put’ appears only in nuclear subordination,
whereas ar- ‘be’ appears in either nuclear subordination or nuclear coordination. In this chapter two more verbs, k- ‘come’ and ik- ‘go’, are examined
as second conjuncts in nuclear juncture.
As with ar-, the verbs k- and ik- may be linked to the TE-predicate in
either subordination or coordination, but the semantics of the TE K- and TE
IK- constructions are far more complex than those of TE AR-. Traditional
paradigms of feature-based semantics are quite inadequate to describe TE Kand TE IK-. This chapter first analyzes the semantics of these constructions in
terms of the concept of prototype,1 which was already briefly utilized in the
analysis of the TE SIMAW- construction in Chapter 3. It then discusses the
nexus types of the various TE K- and TE IK- constructions.
Section 1 of this chapter demonstrates the necessity of appealing to
prototype semantics in analyzing TE K- and TE IK-. In §2 the canonical uses
of K- and IK- as main predicates are described; in §3, the characteristics of the
TE-predicates are examined using the framework of Vendler (1957). Section
4 summarizes G. Lakoff’s (1987) analysis of THERE-constructions, which
exhibit some similarities with TE K- and TE IK-. Sections 5-9 categorize the
TE K- and TE IK- constructions and illustrate their characteristics in comparison with THERE-constructions. After the full complexity of the semantics
has been laid out, the syntax of TE K- and TE IK- is discussed in Section 10. A
summary follows in Section 11.
1.
PROTOTYPE SEMANTICS
There have been many worthwhile attempts to provide a comprehensive
account of TE K-/IK- (Morita 1968, T. Takahashi 1969, Makiuchi 1972,
Yoshikawa 1976, Endô 1982, Gray 1983, Teramura 1984, M. Hamada 1989).
1 For the notion of prototype, see Rosch (1975, 1978).
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
105
However, most of these are taxonomies of usages, and the explanations they
offer are satisfying only to those who already know these TE-constructions.
Yoshikawa (1976), for example, classifies TE K-/IK- as follows.2
(1) When physical motion is involved, K- indicates motion toward the
speaker, and IK- motion away from the speaker. The TE-predicate
indicates:
a.Action before coming/going.
gohan o
tabete itta.
meal
ACC
eat-TE went
‘Having had a meal, (I) went (there).’
b. Means for coming/going.
kooen ni
aruite
itta.
park
LOC
walk-TE went
‘(I) went to the park on foot.’
c.Circumstance of coming/going.
zyoon wa osoosiki ni
akai huku o
TOP funeral
LOC
red dress ACC
‘Joan wore a red dress to the funeral service.’
kite
wear-TE
kita.
came
(2) When no physical motion is involved:
a.K- indicates a process of emergence.
me
ga
dete
kita.
sprout NOM appear-TE came
‘(The tree) has begun to sprout.’
b. IK- indicates a process of disappearance.
saigo no
kiboo ga
kiete
iku.
last
GEN
hope NOM vanish-TE go
‘There goes our last hope.’
c.K- and IK- indicate a process of change.
onaka
ga
suite
kita.
stomach NOM become.empty-TE came
‘(I) became hungry.’
kusa ga
grass NOM
nobite
grow-TE
iku.
go
2 The example sentences in (1) and (2) were constructed by the present author.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘The grass is growing tall.’
d. K- indicates the inception of a process.
ame ga
hutte
kita.
rain NOM fall-TE came
‘It began raining.’
e.K- indicates continuation up to the reference time.
dandan
wakatte
kimasita
ne.
gradually understand-TE came(POL) PRT
‘(S/he) has gradually understood (it), hasn’t (s/he)?’
f. IK- indicates continuation from the reference time.
dandan
wakatte
ikimasu yo.
gradually understand-TE go(POL) PRT
‘(S/he) will gradually understand (it).’
For those who are not familiar with the TE K-/IK- constructions, this type of
list conveys the spurious impression that these usages are independent of each
other, and thus must be learned separately. Interestingly, T. Takahashi (1975)
reports that children about age 4 have already acquired all these
TE-constructions except (2e,f), which are learned after age 6.3 Explanations
regarding the order of acquisition have tended to be somewhat ad hoc within
previous frameworks.
The problems with structurally identical and yet semantically distinct
clusters of constructions have been recognized by empirical linguists for
some time. Fillmore (1975, 1982a,b), for example, urges the adoption of a
semantic theory which is based on the idea of prototype. In prototype semantics, the meaning of a linguistic form is represented through the presentation of a prototype rather than through a statement of necessary and
sufficient conditions for the form to be used appropriately. Prototype semantics can not only tell us how each TE-construction is related to the canonical meaning of K-/IK-, but can also predict that those TE-constructions in
which the canonical meaning of K-/IK- is preserved should be easier to learn
than those in which the meaning is deviant.
Another problem with previous analyses is that no attempt has been
3 It might be claimed, as Takahashi does, that the TE-construction denoting a process
of disappearance (2b) is also missing from young children’s speech. The validity of
this claim depends on how one classifies the common phrase sinde ik- ‘die go’ (i.e.
‘die’), which is learned at an early age. If this is classified under (2b), the claim is
false; Takahashi, however, considers it an instance of the TE-construction denoting a
process of change (2c), not (2b).
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
107
made to explain the interaction between the choice of K- vs. IK- and the
grammatical tense of a particular TE-construction. For example, in (3a) the
same situation can be expressed by both K- and IK-, but only if the former is in
the past tense and the latter in the nonpast tense, whereas in (3b) both must be
in the nonpast tense. This phenomenon cannot be explained without referring
to underlying metaphors, as was done by Lakoff (1987) for
THERE-constructions (see §4 below).
(3) a.danro no
hi
ga
kiete
{kita/iku}.
hearth GEN fire NOM vanish-TE came/go
‘The fire in the hearth is about to go out.’
b. dandan
samuku natte
gradually be.cold become-TE
‘It will become cold gradually.’
{kuru/iku}.
come/go
In this chapter, I will categorize the TE K-/IK- constructions according to
underlying metaphors and illustrate how each TE-construction is related to the
central TE-construction, wherein K- and IK- indicate both motion and direction in physical space just as they do as main predicates. I will demonstrate
that no adequate description of TE K-/IK- can be achieved without recourse to
the concepts of prototype and metaphorical mapping.
2.
THE VERBS K- AND IK-
2.1.
Concepts Involved in K- and IK-
The relationships between the meaning of K- and IK- as main verbs, which
may be called the canonical meaning of K- and IK-, and the meanings of these
verbs in the TE-constructions are not arbitrary, although they are not obvious
in such taxonomies as (1) and (2). Generally, a lexical item comprises a
bundle of concepts, some of which may be more central than others. In a
prototypical usage, all of the salient concepts are present; in nontypical usages only some of them are.4 Therefore, in order to see the relationships
4 Fillmore (1982b) notes that the lexical item breakfast typically indicates the meal
which is eaten early in the day, after a period of sleep, and which consists of a
somewhat unique menu. However, any one of these three concepts may be absent,
and yet the word still can be appropriately uttered to refer to a particular meal. One
may call breakfast the meal of eggs, toast, coffee, and orange juice eaten at sunrise
without sleep, or such a meal eaten at three o’clock in the afternoon after long sleep
through the morning. Or one may call a meal consisting of cabbage soup and choc-
108
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
between the canonical meaning of K- and IK- and their meanings in
TE-constructions, it is essential to identify the concepts typically encoded in
the former.
Five concepts — motion, direction, duration, origin, and goal — are
associated with K- and IK-.
A.
B.
C.
D.
E.
Motion: The entity moves.
Direction: The motion is either toward or not toward the speaker.
Duration: The motion is understood to have duration in the time domain.
Origin: The entity has some location before the motion takes place.
Goal: The entity has some location when the motion is completed.
A and B are inherent properties of the lexical items K- and IK-, and D and E
can be expressed by postpositional phrases. However, C is not an inherent
part of K- and IK-, but rather is part of the frames or scenarios that these verbs
evoke (cf. Fillmore 1982b, 1985a,b). As lexical items, K- and IK- are
punctual achievements which cannot be used to focus on the duration of a
motion. In Japanese the general grammatical means for expressing the progressive (imperfective) aspect is the TE I- construction, (4a), but TE I- does
not work with K- or IK-, as shown in (4b), even though coming and going
obviously take some time.
(4) a. zyoon
wa
ima hon o
yonde
iru.
now book ACC read-TE be-NPST
‘Joan is reading a book now.’
TOP
b. *zyoon
wa
ima gakkoo ni
now school LOC
‘Joan is on the way to school now.’
TOP
itte
iru.
go-TE be-NPST
[intended]
The concept of duration is called for when these verbs are accompanied
by both origin and goal NPs, as in (5).
(5) tookyoo
kara
ABL
kyooto ni
LOC
{kuru/iku}
come/go
ni
wa
CMPL
TOP
go-zikan kakaru.
5.hours take
‘It takes five hours to {come/go} to Kyoto from Tokyo.’
If the mover is not the speaker, time adverbials are associated with the arrival
olate pie breakfast if one has it in the morning after sleep through the night. Or some
establishments even serve ‘breakfast’ all day. See also Coleman and Kay (1981) for
the English verb lie.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
109
rather than the departure with K-, (6a), whereas they are associated with the
departure with IK-, (6b).
(6) a.san-zi
ni zyoon wa tookyoo kara kyooto ni
kita.
3.o’clock LOC Joan TOP
ABL
LOC
came
‘At 3 o’clock, Joan came to Kyoto from Tokyo. (Joan arrived at
Kyoto at 3.)’
b. san-zi
ni zyoon wa tookyoo kara kyooto ni itta.
3.o’clock LOC Joan
TOP
ABL
LOC went
‘At 3 o’clock, Joan went to Kyoto from Tokyo. (Joan left Tokyo at
3.)’
This phenomenon indicates that the time adverbials are speaker-oriented; i.e.,
they refer to the time when the mover comes to or goes away from the
speaker. In other words, IK- places a focus on the inception of motion
(leaving for a destination somewhere), and K- on the achievement (arriving at
somewhere) if the mover is not the speaker. If the mover is the speaker, time
adverbials typically indicate the arrival time with both verbs.
While K- and IK- canonically denote motion and direction and imply
duration, these verbs when used in TE-constructions may indicate motion and
direction, or only direction, or direction and duration. Therefore, direction
will be considered as the most central component of the meaning of K- and IKin TE-constructions.
2.2.
Canonical Usages of K- and IK-
K- indicates the motion toward the speaker or toward the place considered to
be the speaker’s territory, e.g. his/her own home or place of employment. IK-,
on the other hand, indicates motion of any orientation except toward the
speaker or his/her territory. When the mover is the speaker, K- is selected if
s/he is at the goal, and IK- if s/he is at the origin at the time of speech. Unlike
English COME/GO, the deictic center of K-/IK- is strictly restricted to the
speaker.5 For instance, if the mover is the speaker and the goal is the hearer’s
house, IK- — but not K- — is the natural selection, whereas if the mover is
someone other than the speaker and the goal is the speaker’s house, K-, but
5 See Fillmore (1972, 1973) for the multiple possibilities of deictic center with English COME and GO. For a comparison of COME/GO and K-/IK-, see Ôe (1975) and
Tokunaga (1986).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
not IK-, will be selected, e.g. (7).6
(7) a. watasi wa
anata no
uti
ni
{iku/#kuru}.
I
TOP
you GEN house LOC
go/come
‘I’ll {go/#come} to your house.’
b.
zyoon
wa
ni
TOP
watasi no
uti
I
GEN
house
‘Joan will {come/#go} to my house.’
LOC
{kuru/#iku}.
come/go
Even if the goal is neither the location of the speaker nor his/her territory, K- may nonetheless be selected when the origin of the mover is farther
away from the speaker than is the goal, i.e. the motion is toward the speaker.
For example, although ano ‘that’ (distal) in (8a) indicates that the store is not
in the speaker’s vicinity, K- may be chosen if the origin of Joan’s motion is
farther away than the store, as illustrated in Figure 1. In (8b), by contrast, the
use of K- is anomalous because given the habitual interpretation indicated by
the nonpast tense and the adverb yoku ‘often’, the origin of the motion (next
door) is closer to the speaker than is the goal, cf. Figure 2.
(8) a. zyoon
wa
yoku ano mise ni {kuru/iku}.
often that store LOC come/go
‘Joan {comes/goes} to that store frequently.’
TOP
b.
tonari
no zyoon wa
yoku ano mise ni
next.door GEN
TOP
often that store LOC
{#kuru/iku}.
come/go
‘My next-door neighbor, Joan, {#comes/goes} to that store
frequently.’



Speaker’s
House
Store
(Goal)
Joan’s
House
FIGURE 1: Both K- and IK- are permitted


Joan’s
House
Store
(Goal)

Speaker’s
House
FIGURE 2: Only IK- is permitted
6 If the speaker moves to his/her own house, kaer- ‘go home, go back’ will be selected
instead of K-.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
111
If the speaker’s location at the speech time is distinct from the goal
which is his/her territory, there will be two potential deictic centers. For
example, assuming that speaker and hearer are both originally together at the
origin, the K- sentence in (9) is appropriate if both the speaker and hearer
move to the goal. The IK- sentence in (10), on the other hand, is appropriate
only if the hearer alone moves to the goal, i.e., if the speaker will not be at the
goal when the hearer arrives there.
(9) ima kara sugu boku no
uti
ni
kite
kudasai.
now ABL soon I
GEN
house LOC come-TE please.do
‘Please come to my house now.’
(Kuno 1978:256)
(10) ima kara sugu boku no
now ABL soon I
GEN
‘Please go to my house now.’
uti
house
(ibid.)
ni
LOC
itte
go-TE
kudasai.
please.do
Kuno (1978) explains this phenomenon in terms of empathy. In this
approach, the first person is higher than the second or third person in the
empathy hierarchy of speech-act participants (a revised version of the hierarchy in Kuno and Kaburaki 1975) — symbolized as E(1st person)>
E(2nd/3rd person). He posits the following empathy constraints for K- and
IK-.
(11)
When the mover is the speaker:
a.K- is selected if the speaker is at the goal at the speech time.
b. IK- is selected if the speaker is at the origin at the speech time.
(12)
When the mover is not the speaker:
a.K- is selected if the speaker’s empathy is stronger toward the
person at the goal than toward the mover (i.e. the person at the
origin), either at the speech time or at the onset of the motion.
E(person at goal) > E(mover = person at origin)
b. IK- is selected otherwise.
E(person at goal)  E(mover = person at origin)
According to Kuno, in sentences with K- the person at the goal must be higher
in the empathy hierarchy than the mover, whereas in sentences with IK- the
person at the goal cannot be higher than the person at the origin.
Regarding example (9) with K-, Kuno claims that if speaker and hearer
are both originally together at the origin but only the hearer moves, the result
will be
E(person at goal=hearer.2nd.person) > E(person at origin=speaker.1st.person)
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
violating the empathy hierarchy. If, on the other hand, the speaker is also a
mover, the result will be:
E(person at goal=speaker at goal) > E(persons at origin=speaker at speech time)
Kuno stipulates the hierarchy of speech-act participants in such a way that the
speaker at the goal is higher in the hierarchy than the speaker at the origin.
However, if this were the case, sentence (13) with K-, also taken from
Kuno (1978), would have to be accepted. Suppose that the sentence is felicitously uttered; both participants move together, and the speaker will be at
the goal when the move is completed:
E(person at goal=speaker at goal) > E(person at origin=speaker at speech time)
Just as before, K- should be unacceptable in (13); but it is not. This demonstrates that Kuno’s analysis is inadequate.
(13) ima kara sugu boku no
uti
now ABL soon I
GEN
house
{#kimasyoo/ikimasyoo}.
come/go-HORT
‘Let’s {#come/go} to my house now.’
ni
LOC
Kuno’s explanation regarding IK- in (10), i.e., the case where the
speaker does not accompany the hearer, is also questionable. He claims that if
the speaker were to move, the result would be
E(person at origin=hearer.2nd.person)  E(person at goal=speaker.1st.person)
violating the empathy hierarchy of speech-act participants (1st person must be
higher than 2nd person). This explanation is absurd because the hearer will
be a mover regardless of the speaker’s accompaniment, since the sentence is
intended to make a request. Therefore, if the speaker were to accompany the
hearer, the equation should be:
E(persons at origin=speaker and hearer)  E(persons at goal=speaker and hearer)
which agrees with the empathy hierarchy, and thus IK- should be acceptable
even when both the speaker and hearer move to the goal in his analysis —
which is not the case.
A more plausible explanation, one which ignores ‘empathy’ entirely,
would be as follows. In (10), the speaker requests that the hearer go to the
speaker’s house. IK- is selected simply because the motion is away from the
speaker at the speech time. Whether or not the speaker accompanies the
hearer is immaterial. It is, rather, the occurrence of K- in (9) that requires
some explanation.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
113
As Ôe (1975) points out, if the speaker presents himself/herself as being
at the goal at the mover’s intended arrival time, K- may be selected even if the
speaker is not at the goal at the speech time, e.g. (14). 7
(14)
zyon ga
konban roku-zi
ni
soko ni
tonight 6.o’clock LOC there LOC
{kimasu/ikimasu} node,
watasi
ga
saki ni itte
come/go(POL)
because I
NOM ahead
go-TE
matte imasu.
(Ôe 1975)
will be waiting (POL)
‘John is {coming/going} there at six tonight, so I am going there
first and will wait (for him).’
NOM
In (9), K- may be selected for just the same reason: because the speaker
intends to be at the goal when the hearer arrives there.
In (13), by contrast, K- is unacceptable because the sentence (hortative)
asserts that the speaker is also a mover and the motion is away from his/her
location at the speech time. Regarding the deictic center, I contend, contra
Kuno, that the speaker’s location at the speech time has precedence over
his/her location when the motion is completed (at the goal). Thus, K- in (13)
is inappropriate.
The final characteristic of canonical usages of K-/IK- is that, like COME
and GO, K- is selected when a moving object comes into sight, e.g. (15a), and
IK- when the object goes out of sight even without a particular goal, e.g.
(15b). These uses motivate the TE K-/IK- constructions of emergence and
disappearance in Yoshikawa’s taxonomy.
(15) a.a, kita.
oh came
‘Oh, (here s/he) comes.’
b. aaa, itte
simatta.
well go-TE put-PST
‘Well, (s/he) is gone.’
Note that (15a) is in the past tense even though the moving entity has not
reached the speaker. The past tense indicates that the entity has entered the
speaker’s sight (as if to say, ‘It has come’). While K- in this use can stand
alone, IK- must be accompanied by simaw- ‘put’, indicating perfective aspect,
7 Ôe in fact claims that IK- in (14) is not acceptable; but it was accepted by all native
speakers of Japanese whom I consulted.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
when it is used to express disappearance of the entity referred to by the subject.
2.3.
Metaphorical Extensions of K- and IK-
Though K- is frequently used metaphorically, i.e. to predicate non-physical
subjects, metaphorical extension of IK- is rather limited in ordinary conversation. As with IK- indicating disappearance, simaw- is needed when the
subject of IK- refers to a non-physical entity. In (16), (a) is a poetic expression, and (b) is unacceptable; (c), (d), and (e), however, are quite ordinary.
(16) a.haru
ga
iku.
spring NOM go
Lit. ‘Spring is going away. (Spring is passing.)’
b. #senzai
itiguu no
kooki ga
1000.years once
GEN
chance NOM
‘The chance of a lifetime has gone.’
itta.
went
c.senzai
itiguu no
kooki ga
itte
simatta.
1000.years once
GEN
chance NOM go-TE put-PST
‘The chance of a lifetime has gone.’
d. haru
ga
kita.
spring NOM came
‘Spring has come.’
e.senzai
itiguu no
kooki ga
kita.
1000.years once
GEN
chance NOM came
‘The chance of a lifetime has come.’
IK- by itself can predicate a non-physical subject only when the subject
refers to or stands metonymically for some information (the conduit metaphor
of Reddy 1979) and the goal is not the speaker, e.g. (17).
(17)
moo sugu {renraku/denwa} ga
ikimasu.
soon
notice/telephone NOM go(POL)
Lit. ‘{Notice/Telephone} will go (to you) soon.’
‘You’ll receive notice/a phone call soon.’
2.4.
Interpretation of Tense Markers
As a general rule for interpretation of tense, past indicates that the event has
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
115
taken place prior to the speech time, and nonpast indicates either that the
event will take place after the speech time or that it is habitual. However,
when a moving entity is visible to both interlocutors, this generalization may
not be observed.
(18) a.a, kotti
ni {kuru/kita}.
oh this.direction LOC come/came
‘Oh, (here it/he/she) comes toward us.’
b. a, migi ni {iku/itta}.
oh right LOC go/went
‘Oh, (it/he/she) goes to the right.’
The past tense in (18a) and the nonpast tense in (18b) deviate from the general
interpretation of tense markers because the moving entity has not yet reached
its goal in the former, and has already started to move in the latter.
In Japanese, when the speaker has identified where some object was
located in the immediate past, the past tense is more likely to be used than the
nonpast tense, as in (19). The past tense in (18a) is to be understood as an
instance of this usage.8
(19)
a, koko ni
atta.
oh here LOC be-PST
Lit. ‘Oh, (it) was here.’ (Oh, here it is.)
As for (18b), the nonpast tense may be used to indicate a process in
progress when the referred entity is visible to both interlocutors, as illustrated
in the following example.
(20)
3.
a, tokeru, tokeru.
oh melt
melt
‘Oh, (it)’s melting.’
AKTIONSART OF TE-PREDICATES
A requirement of TE-predicates in the TE K-/IK- constructions is that they
must indicate some change of state; this condition excludes stative verbs,
unless stative verbs can express temporal states (cf. Be brave/quiet in English). Activities, accomplishments, and achievements can appear as
TE-predicates. Like states, activities do not have any inherent terminal point,
8 See Hirata (1987) for this usage of the past tense.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
e.g. aruk- ‘walk’, mi- ‘watch’, and tabe- ‘eat’, although a terminal point can
be added by ‘quantification’, e.g. iti zikan aruku ‘walk for one hour’ and
ringo o mittu taberu ‘eat three apples’. By contrast, accomplishments and
achievements do have inherent terminal points. Examples of the former are
ake- ‘open’ (transitive), kowas- ‘break’ (transitive), and tate- ‘build’; and for
the latter, ak- ‘open’ (intransitive), koware- ‘break’ (intransitive), and tuk‘arrive’. Achievements are inchoative in nature, whereas accomplishments
involve some causality, i.e., doing something causes a change of state (Dowty
1979).
A useful diagnostic for the Aktionsart of TE-predicates is the semantic
behavior observed when i- ‘be’ is added to the verb in question. For activity
and accomplishment verbs, the addition of i- is the grammatical means for
expressing either progressive (imperfective) aspect or the notion of perfect.
For achievement verbs, it expresses only perfect; for stative verbs, the construction is ungrammatical. For example,
dekite ‘be able’ (state) + iru ‘be’ (NPST)  ungrammatical
tabete ‘eat’ (activity) + iru  ‘is eating/has eaten’
akete ‘open’ (transitive, accomplishment) + iru  ‘is opening/has
opened’
tuite ‘arrive’ (achievement) + iru  ‘has arrived’
As in English, achievements in Japanese cannot co-occur with verbs which
serve as terminative quantifiers, e.g. oe-, owar-, yam- ‘finish/ end’.
Most achievements that occur in TE K-/IK- are durative achievements —
an Aktionsart which is categorized as an achievement by Dowty, but not by
Vendler. If  is an achievement predicate, then if (x) is true in an interval I,
then (x) is false in all subintervals of I. For example, hi ga kieru ‘fire goes
out’ is not true until the fire has actually gone out. However, the event need
not be instantaneous. If the fire becomes weaker, one may anticipate its going
out and say hi ga kie hazimeta ‘The fire began to go out’. Those achievement
predicates which can co-occur with hazime- ‘begin’ are referred to as durative
achievements, e.g. araware- ‘appear’, hutor- ‘become fat’, kie- ‘vanish’,
ukab- ‘spring’, and wakar- ‘understand’.
Punctual achievements, e.g. sin- ‘die’ and tuk- ‘arrive’, may also
co-occur with hazime-; if so, however, such verbs must take a plural subject to
indicate that the event type is repeated, e.g. (21).9
9 When the subject is construed as plural, non-durative achievements can also
co-occur with terminatives, e.g. okyaku-san ga tuki-owatta ‘The guests have finished
arriving’.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
117
(21) a.{tomodati/#zyoon} ga
sini-hazimeta.
friends/Joan
NOM began.to.die
‘{(My) friends/#Joan} began to die (out).’
b. {okyaku-san/*zyoon} ga
tuki-hazimeta.
customers/Joan
NOM began.to.arrive
‘{The customers/*Joan} began to arrive.’
Because achievement verbs cannot be made the progressive by the use
of the TE I- construction, the TE K-/IK- constructions in fact are the primary
means to express progressive aspect of achievements (a process in progress)
in Japanese grammar, e.g. (22b).
(22) a.samuku naru.
be.cold become
‘It will become cold.’
b. samuku natte
{kuru/iku/*iru}.
be.cold become come/go/be-NPST
‘It’s getting cold.’
4.
DEICTIC THERE-CONSTRUCTIONS
Deictic THERE-constructions comprise an extremely rich semantic domain.
Of the eleven subtypes presented by Lakoff (1987), four are relevant to the
analysis of the TE K-/IK- constructions and are exemplified below.10
(23)
(24)
(25)
(26)
Physical-Space THERE-Construction
a. {There goes/Here comes} Harry into the bar.
b. {There goes/Here comes} the bus into the terminal.
Conceptual-Space (Existence) THERE-Construction
a. There goes our last hope.
b. Here comes the chance of a lifetime.
Perceptual-Space THERE-Construction
a. {There goes/Here comes} the beep.
b. {There goes/Here comes} the pain in my knee.
Activity-Start THERE-Construction
a. There goes Harry, meditating again.
10 I have made some changes in the names of the THERE-constructions for expository
purposes; they are not always the same as those used in Lakoff’s analysis.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
b. *Here comes Harry, meditating again. (Physical-Space deixis
only.)
Lakoff presents physical-space deixis as the central case — i.e., the
central function of THERE-constructions is for the speaker to direct the
hearer’s attention, in physical space, to the entity referred to by the subject.
He then explicates how the other deictic THERE-constructions cluster around
the central one by means of metaphors — as in the case of perceptual-space
deixis:
(27)
Conceptual Space (Existence) to Physical Space
a. Concepts are entities.
b. Concepts are located in conceptual space.
c. Existence is location here; nonexistence is location away.
Conceptual-space deixis is minimally distant from central, physical-space
deixis. Things that exist in physical space are located; likewise things that
exist in our mind, where things may come into and go out of existence.
Perceptual-space deixis is distinct from , physical-space deixis in several ways. To take only a single example, sentences realizing the physical-space THERE-construction have corresponding sentences with the
canonical subject-verb word order, shown in (28b).
(28) a. There’s Harry.
b. Harry is there.
Sentences realizing the (non-visual) perceptual-space THERE-construction
show no such correspondence.
(29) a. There’s the beep.
b. *The beep is there.
The metaphors mapping perceptual space to physical space are as follows:
(30) Perceptual Space to Physical Space
a. Percepts are entities.
b. Percepts are located in perceptual space.
c. Realized is distal (THERE); soon-to-be-realized is proximal
(HERE).
d. Activation of perception is motion.
Finally, in the activity-start THERE-construction, in which only
THERE-GOES may appear, there is no motion — only an activity. Activity is
conceptualized in terms of motion along a path, and THERE designates its
starting point. The metaphorical mapping is the following.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
119
(31) Activity-Start Deixis to Physical-Space Deixis
Activities are motions along a path.
In the conceptual-space and perceptual-space THERE-constructions,
THERE-GOES indicates the immediate past, and HERE-COMES the immediate
future — even though in both cases the grammatical tense is fixed to the
nonpast. In the activity-start THERE-construction, by contrast, THERE-GOES
refers to a situation now in progress.
Together with idiosyncratic constraints, the metaphors presented above
predict the selection both of the locative adverbial ( HERE/THERE) and the
motion verb (COME/GO). And the concepts introduced by Lakoff are of equal
utility in classifying the TE K-/IK- constructions.
5.
GENERAL REMARKS ON TE- CONSTRUCTIONS
There are considerable similarities between K-/IK- in the TE-constructions
and COME/GO in the four just-mentioned types of THERE-constructions in
Lakoff’s classification. In the following, I will first categorize TE K-/IKbased on the kind of space in which the verb is to be interpreted. As with the
THERE-constructions, the prototypical TE K-/IK- construction operates in
physical space, with the other TE-constructions linked to it by various metaphorical mappings.
The TE-construction referring to physical space is central for (at least)
two reasons. First, the canonical meaning of K- and IK- is preserved, i.e. the
selection of K-/IK- is based on the same rules which govern K- and IK- as main
predicates. Second, the general rule for the interpretation of tense (cf. §2.4)
remains valid: the past indicates that the event has taken place prior to the
speech time, and the nonpast indicates either that the event will take place
after the speech time or that it is habitual. K- and IK- in the prototypical
TE-construction are thus minimally distant from their canonical uses.
English and Japanese are almost identical regarding the uses of these
basic motion verbs in central, physical-space constructions, so that those who
have acquired one system do not have serious difficulty in understanding the
other. In non-central constructions, however, while spatial metaphors alone
suffice to account for English THERE-constructions, both spatial and temporal metaphors are needed in Japanese to explain the complexity of the
interaction between K-/IK- and the tense in TE-constructions.
6.
PHYSICAL-SPACE TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTIONS
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
6.1.
Prototype: Physical-Motion TE-Construction
The prototypical TE K-/IK- construction is the physical-motion
TE-construction, in which K- and IK- indicate both a motion and its direction
in physical space, just as in main predicates. K- indicates a direction toward
the speaker, whereas IK- indicates any direction except toward the speaker,
e.g. (32).
(32) a.gohan o
tabete {kita/itta}.
meal
ACC
eat-TE came/went
‘Having had a meal, (I) {came (here)/went (there)}.’
b. eki
ni
hasitte {kita/itta}.
station LOC run-TE came/went
Lit. ‘(I) {came/went} to the station running.’
c.hon o
gakkoo ni
motte
{kuru/iku}.
book ACC school LOC hold-TE
come/go
‘(I)’ll {bring/take} the book to school.’
d. zyoon wa
osoosiki ni
akai huku o
Joan
TOP
funeral
LOC
red
dress ACC
{kita/itta}.
came/went
‘Joan wore a red dress to the funeral service.’
kite
wear-TE
In (32d) with K-, the speaker was at the goal when Joan arrived, whereas with
IK- the speaker describes the event from some other perspective.
As Yoshikawa (1976) points out (recall §1), TE-predicates in this usage
indicate an action the subject performed before coming/going, or they indicate the means or circumstance of the motion referred to by K-/IK-. Thus Kand IK- in this TE-construction are predicative, i.e. influencing the truth-value
of the statement. The past tense is used to refer to past events, and the nonpast
to future or habitual events, in conformity with the general rule for the interpretation of tense.
6.2.
Point-of-View TE-Construction
In the physical-motion TE-construction, both motion and direction are expressed by K-/IK-. Somewhat different from this prototype is the case where
the TE-predicate indicates motion, while K- or IK- indicates only direction.
Here K- and IK- convey the speaker’s viewpoint, thereby adding atmosphere
and vivid imagery to the statement. This type of TE-construction is referred to
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
121
as the point-of-view TE-construction.
While the absence of K-/IK- causes a change in truth-value in the
physical-motion TE-construction, in as the point-of-view TE-construction the
verb K-/IK- is not predicative, and hence the statements without K-/IK- retain
the same truth-value, e.g. (33):
(33) a.neko ga
ido
no
naka
ni
otita.
cat
NOM well GEN
inside LOC fell
‘The cat fell into the well.’
b. neko ga
ido
no
naka
ni
otite
{kita/itta}.
cat
NOM well GEN
inside LOC fall-TE came/went
‘The cat {came/went} falling into the well. (The speaker is at the
bottom of the well with kita and outside the well with itta.)’
(Gray 1983)
c.hakutyoo ga
hokkaidoo ni
wataru.
swan
NOM
LOC
migrate
‘Swans will migrate to Hokkaido.’
d. hakutyoo ga
hokkaidoo ni
watatte
{kuru/iku}.
swan
NOM
LOC
migrate-TE
come/go
‘Swans will {come/go} migrating to Hokkaido. (The speaker is in
Hokkaido with kuru and not in Hokkaido with iku.)’
As with the physical-motion TE-construction, in the point-of-view
TE-construction the past tense is used to refer to events in the past. However,
the interpretation of the nonpast tense is slightly different. Generally, the
nonpast tense is used to refer either to future events or to habituals, rather than
to events in progress, but in the point-of-view TE-construction the nonpast
can be used to refer to events in progress. This is a natural consequence of the
function of this TE-construction. In order for the speaker to describe an event
from a particular perspective, s/he will typically witness the event.
6.2.1.
Subtype: Moving-Scenery TE-Construction
When the speaker is moving toward or away from some object, it is possible
to describe the situation from an alternative perspective, as if the speaker were
standing still and the object were moving toward or away from him/her. We
experience this perspective when we travel by car or train; physical objects
seem to come and go as we move through physical space. T E K-/IK- can be
used to convey this shift in perspective, as in sentences (34b,d).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(34) a.yama
ni
tikazuite
itta.
mountain LOC move.closer-TE went
‘(I) went toward the mountain.’
b. yama
ga
tikazuite
kita.
mountain NOM move.closer-TE came
Lit. ‘The mountain came closer (to me).’
c.yama
kara toozakatte
itta.
mountain ABL move.away-TE went
‘(I) went away from the mountain.’
d. yama
ga
toozakatte
itta.
mountain NOM move.away-TE went
Lit. ‘The mountain went away (from me).’
I will call this construction the moving-scenery TE-construction. This
perspective-shifting nuance is unique to the TE K-/IK- construction; if
K-/IK- is the main predicate, it cannot be expressed, cf. (35b).
(35) a. yama
ni
itta.
mountain LOC went
‘(I) went to the mountain.’
b. #yama
ga
kita.
mountain NOM came
Lit. ‘The mountain came.’
The moving-scenery TE-construction is categorized as a subtype of the
point-of-view TE-construction because they have in common the same
characteristics regarding truth-value and tense interpretation.
6.3.
Transfer TE-Construction
There are two kinds of verbs which take a goal NP: those which express a
motion of the referent of the subject (already discussed above), and those
which express a motion of the referent of the direct object, e.g. kas- ‘lend’,
nage- ‘throw’, and okur- ‘send’. When the TE-predicate is a verb of the latter
type, the construction is referred to as the transfer TE-construction. T.
Takahashi (1969) observes that in this TE-construction, where only the referent of the object moves, only K- (not IK-) can be utilized. K- in the transfer
TE-construction typically indicates that the goal is the speaker, and thus the
goal is usually not overtly identified, e.g. (36).
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
(36)
zyoon
123
ga
(watasini)
hanataba o
nagete
kita.
I
LOC
bouquet ACC throw-TE came
‘Joan threw (her) bouquet in my direction.’
NOM
The transferred object need not be a physical entity; e.g., iw- ‘say’ and tutae‘tell’ can be TE-predicates. For example, what is transferred in (37) is Joan’s
words promising the money, not the money itself.
(37)
zyoon
ga
NOM
(watasini) okane o
kasu to
itte
I
LOC money ACC
lend QUOT say-TE
kita.
came
‘Joan said to me that she’ll lend the money (to me/someone).’
Recall (cf. §2.3) that, based on the conduit metaphor, IK- can be predicated of NPs which indicate or stand for information. However, IK- cannot
appear in the transfer TE-construction even when the transferred entity is
information. This constraint is not something that could have been predicted,
and thus must be stated in the description of the transfer TE-construction.
The general rule for the interpretation of tense is applicable in this
TE-construction. The past tense is used to refer to past events, and the nonpast to future or habitual events.
In (36, 37), the sentences with and without K- are synonymous. However, there are cases in which adding K- is obligatory, not because of
non-synonymy, but because of an independently motivated constraint of the
Japanese language — which is the topic of the next section.
6.3.1.
Subject-Centered TE-Predicates
Adding K- (or some other similar empathy shifter, e.g. kure- ‘give’) is obligatory in sentences which describe situations where the speaker is a participant referred to by the goal NP — not by the subject NP — and the verb is
what Kuno and Kaburaki (1975) refer to as subject-centered. Most verbs in
Japanese are either subject-centered, e.g. okur- ‘send’ and age- ‘give’, or
neutral, e.g. iw- ‘say’ and mise- ‘show’. If the verb is subject-centered, the
sentence does not comfortably accommodate the speaker as a direct/indirect
object; thus sentence (38b) is not acceptable.
(38) a.zeemusyo
ga
watasi ni
tokusokuzyoo o
revenue.office NOM I
LOC
demand.note ACC
okutte
kita.
send-TE came
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘The revenue office sent me a demand note.’
b. #zeemusyo
ga
watasi ni
tokusokuzyoo o
revenue.office NOM I
LOC
demand.note ACC
okutta.
sent
‘The revenue office sent me a demand note.’
[intended]
Kuno and Kaburaki claim that with subject-centered verbs, the empathy
hierarchy of surface structure is E(subject)>E(object)>E(agent in passive).
Sentence (38b) then has E(subject=3rd person)>E(object=1st person), which
violates the hierarchy of speech-act participants (cf. §2.2), and is thus unnatural.
However, K- is object-centered (or more appropriately
goal-centered, as Gray 1983 argues), and adding it overrides the surface case
empathy focus and makes the empathy E(object=1st person) >E(subject=3rd
person), in accordance with the empathy hierarchy of speech-act participants.
In short, TE K- functions to convert a subject-centered TE-predicate to object
(goal)-centered.
In general, if the speaker is a participant in the described situation, the
unmarked selection of subject is the speaker. There are, however, three
factors which can make a non-speaker subject acceptable: intrasentential
topic continuity, stylistic distancing, and discourse-topic continuity. Sentence (39b), for example, is acceptable because Joan is selected for the sake of
intrasentential topic continuity.
(39) a.#zyoon {wa/ga}
watasi kara okane o
karita.
TOP/NOM I
ABL
money ACC borrowed
‘Joan borrowed some money from me.’
b. zyoon {wa/ga}
watasi kara okane o
karite
TOP/NOM I
ABL
money ACC borrow-TE
ryokoo ni itta.
travel for went
‘Joan borrowed some money from me and went on a trip.’
The factor of stylistic distancing comes into play if one attempts to
describe an event objectively, i.e., as if some third person were describing it.
Here one can make a distinction between one’s role as narrator and as event
participant by superficially violating the empathy hierarchy of speech-act
participants, selecting another participant as subject and putting oneself in an
object position. Such ‘distancing’ involves a deliberate switch in empathy
focus, however, thereby explaining the apparent violation of the empathy
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
125
hierarchy. This is illustrated in (40).
(40)
tanaka
wa
zizitu watasi kara wairo o
in.fact I
ABL
bribe ACC
‘In fact, Tanaka received a bribe from me.’
TOP
uketotta.
received
On the other hand, if the selection of non-speaker subject, rather than the
speaker himself/herself, is based solely on discourse-topic continuity (not
based on stylistic distancing), it is necessary to signal that the narration is still
made subjectively. It is on this occasion that the speaker adds K- in order to
emphasize his/her point of view.
A subtype of this last use of K- is what Tokunaga (1986) refers to as
affective deixis, in which K- contrasts with KURE- ‘give’ — not with IK-. In
affective deixis, the recipient (indirect object) of KURE- is the speaker (or the
speaker’s ‘insider’, e.g. family members).11 If the speaker is grateful to the
referent of the subject for his/her act in which the speaker is the recipient, TE
KURE- will be selected. If, on the other hand, the speaker is annoyed with the
person at his/her act, TE K- will be selected. Tokunaga (130) illustrates this
contrast using the examples in (41).
(41) a.tomu wa
watasi ga
komatte ita
node
okane
I
NOM was.in.trouble because money
o
kasite
kureta.
ACC
lend-TE gave
‘Tom lent me money because I was in trouble (with money, and I
am grateful to him).’
TOP
b. tomu wa
watasi ga
iranai
to
iu
I
NOM
need-NEG QUOT say
noni
okane o
kasite
kita.
although money ACC lend-TE came
‘Tom lent me money, although I said I didn’t need it (and I am
annoyed).’
TOP
Note, however, that K- in (42) does not carry this negative connotation.
(42)
ginkoo ga
(yatto) okane o
kasite
bank
NOM
finally money ACC lend-TE
‘(Finally,) the bank lent me the money.’
kita.
came
The difference is due to differing expectations regarding social norms. For a
11 For the concept of insider/outsider, see Wetzel (1984, 1985).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
bank to lend money is a routine transaction; for a friend to lend money is not.
Therefore, if a friend did lend money to the speaker, the speaker would be
grateful; the use of K- indicates that this normal expectation does not hold.
On the other hand, if it is a bank which lent the money, the speaker typically
need not show appreciation (the dimension of gratitude/annoyance becomes
irrelevant), and consequently K- does not imply the speaker’s annoyance.
(The use of K- in the latter case is an instance of the point-of-view
TE-construction.) Generally, K- or KURE- must be used when the speaker is
encoded as the indirect object of a subject-centered verb.
TABLE 1
Properties of Physical-Space TE K-/IK- Constructions
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________
Construction
K-/IK-
K-/IK- affects
indicates
truth value
Past
Nonpast
Tense Tense
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________
Main predicate
Physical-motion
Point-of-view
Transfer
Motion, Direction
Motion, Direction
Direction
(K- only) Direction
Yes
Yes
No
No
Past
Past
Past
Past
Fut/Habit
Fut/Habit
Fut/Pres/Habit
Fut/Habit
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
_________________
6.4.
Summary of Physical-Space TE-Constructions
As with their canonical uses as main verbs, K- and IK- in the physical-motion
TE-construction focus on motion and direction. In other words, the canonical
meaning of K- and IK- is preserved, and, consequently, no special metaphors
are needed for an understanding of this TE-construction. The interpretation of
tense is in accordance with the general rules. Children were found to acquire
this TE-construction by ages 3.3-4.4 in Takahashi’s study.
In the point-of-view TE-construction, K- and IK- indicate only direction,
and the motion is expressed by the TE-predicate itself. This TE-construction
is as common as the physical-motion TE-construction in the speech of children of ages 3.3-4.4. This TE-construction has as a subtype the moving-scenery TE-construction, which in Takahashi’s data does not occur in
children up to age 6.6. In the point-of-view TE-construction K- and IK- do not
alter the truth-value judgments of the referent of the TE-predicate. The
general interpretation rule for the past tense is applicable, but the nonpast
tense is interpreted as future, present progressive, or habitual.
In the transfer TE-construction, the moving entity is that referred to by
the object NP; only K- participates in this construction. Like the
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
127
point-of-view TE-construction, K- does not affect the truth value of the
statement. The tense is interpreted according to the general rules. With
subject-centered verbs, the presence of K- or kure- ‘give’ is obligatory in
ordinary conversation. The transfer TE-construction is not found in
Takahashi’s data.
Table 1 above summarizes the properties of the physical-space TE
K-/IK- constructions.
7.
COGNITIVE TE-CONSTRUCTION
K- and IK- in (43) resemble COME and GO in the THERE-construction of
conceptual-space (existence) deixis, as exemplified in Here comes the chance
of a lifetime and There goes our last hope (24).
(43) a.meean
ga
ukande
kita.
good.idea NOM flash-TE came
‘A good idea flashed in my mind.’
b. saigo no
kiboo ga
kiete
last
GEN
hope NOM vanish-TE
‘There goes our last hope.’
iku.
go
In principle, the metaphors for mapping conceptual space (existence) to
physical space in THERE-constructions are also applicable to the sentences in
(43). Therefore, any language user who has acquired these metaphors in
essence already has the appropriate image schema for those sentences.
This use is clearly motivated by the very human conception of birth and
death. To be born is to simultaneously enter the physical and the conceptual
world, and to die is to exit from them — both powerful ideas. Birth is associated with coming, and death with going, as in the following examples (44c-f
are from Lakoff 1987).
(44) a.onna
no
ko
ga
umarete
{kita/kuru}.
female GEN child NOM be.born-TE
came/come
‘A girl {was/will be} born.’
b. heetai ga
sinde
{itta/iku}.
soldier NOM die-TE went/go
‘The soldiers {died/will die}.’
c.There’s a baby on the way.
d. The baby has arrived.
e.He’s gone.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
f. Let us pray for the dear departed.
Naturally, the TE-predicates which occur with K- indicate emergence of some
kind, e.g. araware- ‘appear’, mebae- ‘sprout’, otozure- ‘come for a visit’, and
wak- ‘spring’; those which occur with IK- indicate disappearance, e.g. kie‘vanish’, kudake- ‘break’, sar- ‘leave’, and toke- ‘melt away’.
In the following sentences, K- and IK- resemble COME and GO in the
THERE-construction of non-visual perception, e.g. {Here comes/There goes}
the beep.
(45) a.onaka
ga
suite
kita.
stomach NOM
become.empty-TE came
‘(I) became hungry.’
b. kanasiku natte
sad
become-TE
‘(I) became sad.’
kita.
came
c.hiza no
itami ga
kiete
itta.
knee GEN pain NOM vanish-TE went
‘The pain in (my) knee went away.’
There is no difference regarding the function of K-/IK- in
TE-constructions with conceptual (43) and with perceptual (45)
TE-predicates; I therefore categorize them together as the cognitive
TE-construction.12 In the cognitive TE-construction, entities that exist in the
speaker’s consciousness are considered to have entered the speaker’s cognitive space, and those which are no longer being conceived or perceived are
considered to have exited it. The following metaphors map cognitive space to
physical space (recall (27)).
(46)
Cognitive Space to Physical Space
a.Cognitive objects (concepts/percepts) are entities.
b. Cognitive objects are located in cognitive space.
c.Existence is location here; nonexistence is location away.
Figure 3 represents the image schema for the cognitive TE-construction.
Note that this image schema is purely spatial; it has nothing to do with the
12 The term cognitive is justified here because the perception expressed by perceptual
TE-predicates is the kind that has undergone some cognitive processing, not the
lower-level perception which contrasts with cognition. For example, we perceive and
react to pain even while sleeping; but (45c) is not appropriate to describe this situation.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
129
tense on K-/IK-.
NON-EXISTENCE
KIK-
Cognitive Space
EXISTENCE
FIGURE 3: Image Schema for the Cognitive TE-Construction
In the cognitive TE-construction, the goal with K- and the origin with IK- are
fixed to the speaker’s cognitive space. The origin with K- and the goal with
IK- are immaterial.
The tense on K- indicates the time of entrance, and that on IK- the time
of exit. Because the goal with K- and the origin with IK- are both the
speaker’s cognitive space, K- focuses on the completion, and IK- on the
inception, of metaphorical motion. This difference is also observable when
K- and IK- are used as main predicates with both origin and goal NPs — a
phenomenon discussed earlier (§2.1). Because K- and IK- in the cognitive
TE-construction express how the event is recognized by the speaker — not to
express the event itself — they do not affect the truth-value of the statement.
Takahashi’s data on children’s speech show that umarete k‘be-born-come’ and sinde ik- ‘die-go’ are learned by ages 3.3-4.4, but that in
general the application of the concepts of emergence and disappearance in
cognitive space is only learned much later. Some examples of the cognitive
TE-construction with K- occur in his data, but none with IK-.
8.
MOVING-WORLD TE- CONSTRUCTION
Fillmore (1971) points out that time is one-dimensional and unidirectional,
i.e., if two events occur at different times, one of them is necessarily earlier or
later than the other. He recognizes two metaphors for time: we can regard
time as stable and ourselves as moving through time, or we can regard ourselves as stable and time as passing by us. The former metaphor is referred to
by the term moving world, and the latter by moving time. In the moving-world
metaphor, we have come to the present from the past and will go into the
future, whereas in the moving-time metaphor, the future comes to us, and the
past goes away from us.
The physical-space and cognitive TE-constructions are purely spatial in
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
nature. K- and IK- indicate motion and/or direction, and generally make no
reference to the internal temporal structure of the action or event expressed by
the TE-predicate. On the other hand, recognition that the motion expressed by
K- and IK- has three phases — the inception, the process, and the completion
— is essential for understanding the moving-world TE-construction.
The THERE-construction which exhibits a certain degree of
re-semblance to the moving-world TE-construction is the one indicating
activity-start, e.g. There he goes, meditating again. Lakoff posits the metaphor ACTIVITIES ARE MOTIONS ALONG A PATH to explain this construction. In the activity-start THERE-construction, only THERE-GOES, not
HERE-COMES, can designate the starting point on an activity path. This
metaphor, in which GO implies a path toward the future, is thus in accordance
with moving-world. The TE K-/IK- construction may encode a similar concept, as illustrated in (47).
(47)
yasai
kara tabete iku.
vegetable ABL eat-TE go
‘(I)’ll begin eating with (lit. from) the vegetables.’
While the activity-start metaphor is restricted in English to situations
where (i) the onset of activity has just taken place and (ii) the activity is
on-going at the speech time, the moving-world metaphor applies more
broadly in the case of Japanese: in (48) only (ii) is expressed.
(48) a.rokuzyuu nen ikite
kita.
60
years live-TE came
‘(I) have lived for 60 years.’
b. zutto
gaman-site kita.
for.a.long.time endure-TE came
‘(I) have endured (it) a long time.’
Unlike the activity-start THERE-construction, non-agentive achievement verbs can appear as TE-predicates in the moving-world TE-construction,
e.g. (49).
(49) a.kono ko
wa
dandan
hahaoya ni
nite
this child TOP gradually mother
DAT
resemble-TE
kita.
came
‘The child gradually came to resemble her mother.’
Past
Ref. Point

Future
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
KIK-

131

FIGURE 4: Image Schema for the Moving-World TE-Construction
b. moo
sugu miti
ga
suite
kuru.
a.little soon street NOM become.less.crowded-TE come
‘The streets will be less crowded soon.’
In the moving-world TE-construction, the choice between K- and IK- is
based on when the inception of the event takes place. If the inception is
temporally prior to the reference point and the event is on-going at that point,
K- will be selected; if the inception is after the reference point, IK- will be
selected. Figure 4 above illustrates this schema.
Because the reference point is typically the speech time, K- is more
likely to occur in the past and IK- in the nonpast.
(50) a.dandan
wakatte
kimasita
ne.
gradually understand-TE
came(POL) PRT
‘(S/he) has gradually understood (it), hasn’t (s/he)?’
b. dandan
wakatte
ikimasu yo.
gradually understand-TE
go(POL) PRT
‘(S/he) will gradually understand (it).’
c.ima made kare no
wagamama o
mitomete kita
now until he
GEN
selfishness ACC tolerate-TEcame
keredo, kore kara wa
kyohi-site iku.
but
this ABL TOP reject-TE go
‘(I) have tolerated his selfish acts until now, but (I)’ll reject them
from now on.’
If K- is in the nonpast tense (kuru) or IK- is in the past tense (itta), some
context is necessary to indicate that the reference point is distinct from the
speech time, as in (51).
(51) a.miti ga
konde
kuru
kara
hayaku
street NOM become.crowded-TE come because soon
kaerimasyoo.
return-HORT
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘(If we wait too long,) the street will have gotten crowded, so
let’s go home now.’
b. sentaku-sitara sode
ga
tizinde
itta.
when.wash
sleeve NOM
shrink-TE went
‘When (I) washed it, the sleeves (thereupon) shrank.’
Iku (nonpast) occasionally indicates that the event referred to by the
TE-predicate is now in progress, e.g. (52). In such a case, both interlocutors
are observing the change of state.
(52)
koori ga
tokete
iku.
ice
NOM melt-TE
go
‘The ice is melting away (now).’
As shown in (53), even though K- and IK- implicitly involve a focus on
the inception, the inception (at 8 o’clock) cannot be further specified.
(53)
*hati zi
ni
iti peezi me kara yonde
8
o’clock LOC first.page
ABL
read-TE
{itta/iku/kita/kuru}.
went/go/came/come
‘(I) {started/will start} reading from the first page at 8 o’clock.’
Because the decomposition of motion into three phases is not part of the
canonical meaning of K- and IK-, these verbs as they occur in the moving-world TE-construction are semantically fairly remote from canonical Kand IK-. The construction is therefore not particularly easy to learn, especially when the reference time and the speech time are distinct, i.e. K- in the
nonpast tense and IK- in the past tense. In Takahashi’s data, the moving-world TE-construction with K- has been learned by children at ages
3.3-4.4; but in his data K- is mostly in the past tense, and when the nonpast
tense is used, it is the so-called historical present, referring to the past. K- in
the ‘true’ nonpast tense does not occur in the speech of children even at age
6.6. The TE-construction with IK- is absent in the speech of children at ages
3.3-4.4, but it emerges about ages 4.1-5.6. There is no occurrence of IK- in
the past tense in the data up to age 6.6.
As with the cognitive TE-construction, K- and IK- in the moving-world
TE-construction do not affect the truth-value of the statement. For example,
sentences (47, 49b, 50c, 51a,b), and (52) can be paraphrased without K- or
IK-. In sentences (48a,b) K- indicates present relevance of the past event, so
that even though K- is irrelevant to the truth-value judgment, the speaker’s
intention would not be clear without K-. Sentences (49a) and (50a,b) are
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
133
anomalous without K- or IK-; however, the anomaly is due to the collocation
of the punctual achievement verb and the adverbial dandan ‘gradually’. As
discussed in §3, the TE K-/IK- constructions are the primary means to express
progressive aspect of achievements in Japanese grammar.
9.
MOVING-TIME TE- CONSTRUCTION
The final TE K-/IK- construction is based on the moving-time metaphor: TIME
COMES TOWARD US FROM THE FUTURE AND GOES AWAY FROM US
INTO THE PAST. This TE-construction parallels the moving-scenery
TE-construction in physical space (§6.2.1), in which the observer does not
move but the scenery does.
(54) a.haru
ga
megutte
kita.
spring NOM come.round-TE came
‘Spring has come again.’
b. akarui mirai ga
otozurete kuru.
bright future NOM visit-TE
come
‘A bright future will come (to us).’
c.toki ga
toori-sugite
time NOM pass-TE
‘Time passed (us by).’
itta.
went
d. kako ga
toozakatte
iku.
past NOM move.away-TE go
Lit. ‘The past is moving away.’
Although some native speakers might consider that the choice between
K- and IK- somewhat resembled that found in the cognitive TE-construction,
the TE-predicates in the moving-time TE-construction need not express
emergence/disappearance of any kind, and the image schemas for these two
types of TE-constructions are different. In the cognitive TE-construction,
there is a bounded cognitive space, and the entities enter ( K-) and exit (IK-)
the space (recall Figure 3). In the moving-time TE-construction, there is no
bounded space — only a path along which time moves, as illustrated in the
following figure.
Past
Now

KITA
IKU
Future

KURU

134
ITTA
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage

FIGURE 5: Image Schema for the Moving-Time TE-Construction
K- and IK- in the moving-time TE-construction do not affect the
truth-value of the statement. Sentences (54b-d) can express the same idea
without K- or IK-; (54a) without K- is unnatural for a stylistic reason.
10.
SYNTAX OF THE TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTIONS
10.1. Nuclear Subordination
It has been demonstrated that in all but the physical-motion TE-construction,
K- and IK- do not affect the truth-value of the proposition expressed by the
core. Neither do they affect the valence of the complex nucleus. That is,
although both K- and IK- as independent verbs have a ni-locative (goal) NP in
their valences, such an NP can only appear in TE K-/IK- if it is in the valence of
the TE-predicate. For example, samuku nar- ‘become cold’ does not itself
take a ni-locative; the collocation with a ni-locative in the TE K-/IK- construction is thus ungrammatical (55b, 56b).
(55) a.dandan
samuku natte
kuru.
gradually be.cold become-TE come
‘It will become cold gradually.’ (COGNITIVE/MOVING-TIME)
b. *koko ni dandan
samuku {naru/
natte
kuru}.
here LOC gradually be.cold become become-TE come
‘It will become cold gradually here.’
[intended]
(56) a.dandan
samuku natte
iku.
gradually be.cold become-TE go
‘It will become cold gradually.’
(MOVING-WORLD)
b. *koko ni dandan
samuku {naru/
natte
iku}.
here LOC gradually be.cold become become-TE go
‘It will become cold gradually here.’
[intended]
In all but the physical-motion TE-construction, K- and IK- modify the aspect
of the TE-predicate; hence they are analyzed as being in nuclear subordination, modifying the nuclear layer (cf. Chapter 2 §5.7).
In the point-of-view, transfer, and cognitive TE-constructions, K- and
IK- indicate the direction of (abstract or concrete) motion vis-à-vis the position of the speaker.
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
135
Teramura (1984) points out that when K- and IK- are functioning as
‘auxiliaries’, they cannot themselves predicate anything of the subject, e.g.
(57b, 58b). This fact is captured well in RRG in terms of nuclear subordination: K- and IK- are subordinated and thus are not directly predicative of the
subject.
(57) a.roosoku no
hi
ga
kiete
iku.
candle
GEN
flame NOM go.out-TE go
‘The candle is about to go out.’
b. *roosoku no
hi
ga
candle GEN flame NOM
‘The candle is about to go.’
iku.
go
(58) a.piano no
oto
ga
kikoete
kuru.
piano GEN sound NOM sound-TE come
‘The sound of a piano is heard.’
b. *piano no
oto
ga
kuru.
piano GEN sound NOM come
‘The sound of a piano comes.’
Figures 6 and 7 illustrate the syntactic structures of two subtypes of TE
K-/IK- involving nuclear subordination (59a,b).
(59) a.danro no
hi ga
kiete
kita.
hearth GEN fire NOM vanish-TE came
‘The fire in the hearth is about to go out.’
(MOVING-WORLD)
b. hakutyoo ga
hokkaidoo ni
watatte itta.
swan
NOM
LOC
migrate-TE went
‘Swans migrated to Hokkaido. (The speaker is not in Hokkaido.)’
(POINT-OF-VIEW)
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
danro no hi ga
kiete
ki-
NUC
DIR
ta
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 6: Nuclear Subordination (Moving-World TE-Construction)
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
hakutyoo ga hokkaidoo ni watatte
NUC
it-
ta
DIR
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 7: Nuclear Subordination (Point-of-View TE-Construction)
10.2. Nuclear Coordination
In the physical-motion TE-construction, K- and IK- indicate a motion and its
direction in physical space, as they do as main predicates. In this construction, moreover, a ni-locative which is not in the valence of the TE-predicate is
permitted, e.g. (60b, 61b). Given that K- and IK- do play a role here in the
specification of core arguments, the nexus type cannot be subordination.
(60) a.*gakkoo ni
okane o
motta.
school LOC money ACC carried
‘(I) carried some money to school.’
[intended]
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
137
CLAUSE
CORE
NUC
ARG
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
PRED
gakkoo ni okane o mota- nai-de
it-
ta
NUC NEG NUC
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 8: Nuclear Coordination (Physical-Motion TE-Construction)
b. gakkoo ni
okane o
motte
itta.
school LOC money ACC carry-TE went
‘(I) took some money to school.’
(61) a.*marii
wa
soogizyoo
ni akai huku o
kita.
funeral.place LOC red
cloth ACC wore
‘Mary wore a red dress to the funeral.’
[intended]
TOP
b. marii wa
soogizyoo
ni akai huku o
kite
kita.
funeral.place LOC red cloth ACC wear-TE came
‘Mary came to the funeral wearing a red dress.’
TOP
Because it is possible to separately negate just the first predicate (using
the nuclear negative operator nai-de), as shown in (62), the nexus type in this
construction must be coordination rather than cosubordination. Figure 8
above illustrates the linkage in (62a).
(62) a.gakkoo ni
okane o
mota-nai-de
itta.
school LOC money ACC carry-NEG-TE went
‘(I) went to school without carrying money.’
b. marii wa
soogizyoo
ni
kuroi huku o
funeral.place LOC black cloth ACC
ki-nai-de
kita.
wear-NEG-TE came
‘Mary came to the funeral without wearing a black dress.’
TOP
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
In nuclear coordination, the linked nuclei act as a single nucleus and
take a single set of core arguments. The TE-predicate may well take a
ni-locative in its valence, and of course K-/IK- can always take a ni-locative;
but when the two are combined in nuclear coordination, only a single
ni-locative may appear in the core. For example, yor- ‘stop by’, as well as IK-,
takes a ni-locative (63a,b), but two ni-locatives are not permitted (63c). If (as
here) the TE-predicate has a ni-locative in its valence, then the locative is
always associated with the TE-predicate and not with K- or IK- (63d). Note,
too, that the subject of the complex nucleus must bear the macrorole of actor
(not undergoer) with respect to both TE-predicate and K-/IK-.
(63) a.sono mise ni
yotta.
that store LOC stopped.by
‘(I) stopped by the store.’
b. ginkoo ni
itta.
bank
LOC
went
‘(I) went to the bank.’
c.*ginkoo ni
sono mise ni
yotte
itta.
bank
LOC
that store LOC stop.by-TE went
‘Stopping by the store, (I) went to the bank.’
[intended]
d. mise ni
yotte
itta.
store LOC stop.by-TE went
‘(I) stopped by the store (and went to somewhere else).’
NOT: ‘(I) stopped by somewhere and went to the store.’
K-/IK- has the following formula in its LS:
BECOME [be-at´(x,y)]
(x=LOCATIVE; y=THEME)
When K-/IK- is coordinated with the TE-predicate at the nuclear level, rules
(i) and (ii) will hold.
(i) ACTOR (TE-predicate)=ACTOR (K-/IK-)
(ii) If the TE-predicate contains a locative in its LS:
BECOME (be-at´(x, [TE-pred´(y,z)])
(x  ; y=LOCATIVE; z=ACTOR)
Otherwise:
BECOME (be-at´(x, [TE-pred´(y,(z))])
(x=LOCATIVE; y=ACTOR; z (optional argument)  LOCATIVE)
If two ni-locatives are to be present, then core-level — rather than nuclear-level — linkage must be utilized (see Chapter 5). In core linkage, the
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
139
ni-locative argument of K- or IK-, e.g. ginkoo ni in (64), intervenes between
the two predicates.
(64)
sono mise ni
yotte
ginkoo ni
itta.
that store LOC stop.by-TE bank LOC went
‘(I) stopped by the store and went to the bank.’
Or else ginkoo ni may be fronted and ni marked with an emphatic H (high)
tone followed by a pause, as indicated by the comma in (65). This H not only
signals that the NP is not in its canonical position but also conveys information about phrase boundaries. When yotte and itta are linked in nuclear
juncture, the insertion of a minor-phrase boundary is optional, i.e., both
predicates are likely to be uttered in a single minor phrase. By contrast, when
yotte and itta are linked in core juncture, the presence of a minor-phrase
boundary, or preferably a major-phrase boundary, is obligatory (cf. Chapter 3
§1.1). The commas in (65) thus represent not only a pause but also minor- or
major-phrase boundaries.
(65)
ginkoo ni,
sono mise ni
yotte,
itta.
bank
LOC
that store LOC stop.by-TE went
‘(I) stopped by the store and went to the bank.’
When the TE-predicate does not take a ni-locative, there is a choice
between linking the two predicates in nuclear or in core juncture.
(66) a.okane o
ginkoo ni
motte
itta.
money ACC bank
LOC
carry-TE went
‘(I) took some money to the bank.’
(Nuclear Juncture)
b. okane o
motte
ginkoo ni
itta.
money ACC carry-TE bank
LOC
went
‘(I) carried some money and went to the bank.’ (Core Juncture)
However, there is a subtle difference between (66a) and (66b). In (66a),
carrying some money and going to the bank are considered to be a single
event, ‘taking some money to the bank.’ In (66b), on the other hand, they are
considered to be two separate events. Hence (67a) is anomalous while (67b)
is not.
(67) a.#okane
o
ginkoo ni
motte
itta
keredo,
money ACC bank
LOC
carry-TE went but
totyuu de
otosite
simatta.
on.the.way drop-TE put-PST
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘(I) took some money to the bank but dropped (it) on the way.’
[intended]
b.
okane o
motte
ginkoo ni itta
keredo,
money ACC carry-TE bank
LOC went but
totyuu de otosite
simatta.
on.the.way drop-TE put-PST
‘(I) carried some money and went to the bank but dropped (it)
on the way.’
Y. Matsumoto (1990c) points out that the difference between these two
linkage types is also apparent in differing interpretations of a purpose phrase.
For example, if roon o harai ni ‘to pay a monthly installment’ is added to
(66), both acts (carrying money and going to the bank) are understood to be
done for this purpose in (66a); in (66b), by contrast, only going to the bank is
necessarily understood to be done for this purpose while carrying money need
not be. These differences are fully in keeping with an analysis of (66a) as
nuclear coordination vis-à-vis (66b) as core juncture — the latter to be discussed in the next chapter.
11. SUMMARY
In this chapter, K- and IK- in nuclear TE-juncture have been examined. I have
argued that there are six distinct TE K-/IK- constructions in which K-/IKmarks the direction and/or aspect, viz. the physical-motion, point-of-view,
transfer, cognitive, moving-world, and moving-time TE-constructions.
The first three TE-constructions have physical space as their operating
domain. The physical-motion TE-construction counts as the central case in
that its analysis requires no special metaphor. In the point-of-view
TE-construction, K- and IK- indicate only direction, designating the speaker’s
point of view in physical space and thereby adding ambiance and vividness to
the description. In the transfer TE-construction, only K- can be utilized. In
these TE-constructions, the past tense is used to denote events in the past, and
(except with the point-of-view TE-construction), the nonpast is used to denote
future or habitual events. In the point-of-view TE-construction, the nonpast
may be used to denote events in progress at the speech time.
PHYSICAL-MOTION TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Coordination
ACTOR (TE-predicate)=ACTOR (K-/IK-)
If the TE-predicate contains a locative in its LS:
BECOME (be-at´(x, [TE-pred´(y, z)])
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
141
(x  ; y=LOCATIVE; z=ACTOR)
Otherwise:
BECOME (be-at´(x, [TE-pred´(y, (z))])
(x=LOCATIVE;
y=ACTOR; z (optional argument)  LOCATIVE)
Semantics: The TE-predicate indicates an action before coming/going, a
means for coming/going, or circumstance of coming/going.
POINT-OF-VIEW TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: K- and IK- modify the direction of the TE-predicate.
Pragmatics: K- and IK- designate the speaker’s vantage point in
physical space.
TRANSFER TE K- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: K- modifies the direction of the TE-predicate.
Pragmatics: K- converts the subject-centered TE-predicate to goalcentered.
In the cognitive TE-construction, entities currently active in the speaker’s consciousness have come into cognitive space in the past and exist there
at the speech time (TE kita ‘came’); those yet to be realized will come into the
space in the future (TE kuru ‘come’). Those which were real but are not real
any longer have left the space (TE itta ‘went’), and those which are likely to
become not real will leave the space in the future (TE iku ‘go’). The general
interpretive rules of tense are applicable in the cognitive TE-construction.
COGNITIVE TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: K- and IK- modify the direction of the TE-predicate.
Pragmatics: K- indicates that the TE-situation becomes active in the
speaker’s consciousness; IK- indicates that the TE-situation
exits from the speaker’s consciousness.
The moving-world TE-construction is based on the metaphor of moving
world, and K-/IK- indicates the temporal relationship between the event and
the chosen reference point in time. If the inception of the event was before the
reference time and the event is on-going at the reference time, K- is selected;
if the inception is after the reference point, IK- is selected. If the inception
was before the speech time, the past tense is selected; if it is after the speech
time, the nonpast tense is selected.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
MOVING-WORLD TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: K- and IK- modify the aspect of the TE-predicate.
Pragmatics: The aspect is expressed based on the moving-world
metaphor.
The moving-time TE-construction is based on the moving-time metaphor. The moving entity in this TE-construction is time — either time itself or
a period of time such as a season.
MOVING-TIME TE K-/IK- CONSTRUCTION
Syntax: Nuclear Subordination
Semantics: K- and IK- modify the aspect of the TE-predicate.
Pragmatics: The aspect is expressed based on the moving-time
metaphor.
It is important to note that the cognitive, moving-world, and moving-time TE-constructions are not mutually exclusive, and further-more that
the same event may be expressed with either K- or IK-, as illustrated in (68).
(68) a.danro no
hi ga
kiete
iku.
hearth GEN fire NOM vanish-TE go
‘The fire in the hearth is about to go out.’
(COGNITIVE)
b. danro no
hi ga
kiete
kita.
hearth GEN fire NOM vanish-TE came
‘The fire in the hearth is about to go out.’
(MOVING-WORLD)
In both (68a, b), the fire has begun to go out prior to the speech time, and it
has not yet completely disappeared. While (68a) is in the cognitive
TE-construction, in which IK- is selected because the fire is going out of
existence, (68b) is in the moving-world TE-construction, in which K- is
selected because the inception is before the reference time (here coinciding
with the speech time) and the event is on-going at that time.
Similarly, K- is selected in (69a) because someone’s true intention is
predicted to become apparent in the future. But IK- is selected in (69b) because the revealing of someone’s true intention is predicted to occur after the
reference time, NOW.
(69) a.honne
ga
arawarete kuru.
(COGNITIVE)
true.intention NOM reveal-TE come
Chapter 4: TE-Linkage with Nuclear Juncture: Part II
143
‘(Her) true intention will surface.’
b. honne
ga
arawarete iku.
true.intention NOM reveal-TE go
‘(Her) true intention will surface.’
(MOVING-WORLD)
If K- occurs with a verb of disappearance, e.g. (68b), or IK- with a verb
of emergence, (69b), the sentence is in the moving-world TE-construction. If,
on the other hand, K- occurs with a verb of emergence, or IK- with a verb of
disappearance, the type of TE-construction cannot be determined solely from
the sentence. The speaker may have chosen K-/IK- according to the COGNITIVE-SPACE-AS-PHYSICAL-SPACE metaphor or according to the moving-world metaphor, making the sentence potentially ambiguous in this
respect, e.g. (70c).
(70) a.kiboo ga
umarete
kita.
hope NOM be.born-TE came
‘New hope has been born.’
b. kiboo ga
umarete
kita.
hope NOM be.born-TE came
‘New hope is about to be born.’
(COGNITIVE)
(MOVING-WORLD)
c.kiboo ga
umarete
kuru.
hope NOM be.born-TE come
‘New hope will be born.’
(COGNITIVE/MOVING-WORLD)
If K- is in the nonpast tense, as in (70c), it implies a future event in both the
cognitive and the moving-world TE-constructions; therefore, no extensional
ambiguity arises, although it is intensionally uncertain which image schema
the speaker has in mind. In the case of IK-, there is no extensional ambiguity
in either the past or the nonpast tense, e.g. (71).
(71) a.saigo no
kiboo ga
kiete
iku.
last
GEN
hope NOM vanish-TE go
‘Our last hope will disappear.’ (COGNITIVE/MOVING-WORLD)
b. saigo no
kiboo ga
kiete
itta.
last
GEN
hope NOM vanish-TE go
‘Our last hope has disappeared.’ (COGNITIVE/MOVING-WORLD)
Another example illustrating the multiple possibilities of underlying
metaphor is provided below. (72a) may be in either the cognitive or the
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
moving-time TE-construction, although there is no extensional ambiguity.
(72) a.dandan
samuku natte
kuru.
gradually be.cold become-TE come
‘It will become cold gradually.’
(COGNITIVE/MOVING-TIME) (=55a)
b. dandan
samuku natte
iku.
gradually be.cold become-TE go
‘It will become cold gradually.’
(MOVING-WORLD) (=56a)
We see, therefore, that K- and IK- may have multiple functions in
TE-constructions. Without the recognition of underlying metaphors, the
selection of K- vs. IK- often can be a bewildering task for the analyst. In many
cases, either verb can appear as directional indicator. However, given a
specific metaphor whose function is to map the direction that
K-/IK- indicates in physical space into some other domain, the selection becomes both
highly restricted and highly predictable in the present analysis.
CHAPTER 5
TE-LINKAGE WITH CORE JUNCTURE
This chapter investigates core-level TE-linkage. In core juncture there are
two cores, each with its own nucleus and its own set of arguments. Serial verb
constructions (cf. Foley and Van Valin 1984, Pullum 1990), which are found
in diverse languages of the world, are typical examples of core juncture.1 In a
serial verb construction, the verbs are merely juxtaposed with no complementizer or conjunction and are linked by virtue of sharing a common core
argument, e.g. ‘Joan lay smoking a cigarette in bed’ and ‘Joan stood playing
the guitar on a street corner.’
Each core in core juncture may be accompanied by its own distinct
core-level operators. For example, in ‘Joan must believe Hiro to be able to
accomplish the task,’ the obligation expressed by the deontic modal must
holds only between Joan and believe, and the ability expressed by be able to
holds only between Hiro and accomplish the task. Thus the cores in this
sentence are independent of each other with respect to these core-level operators.
On the other hand, the linked cores can never be independently specified
vis-à-vis a clause-level operator, regardless of nexus type. All linked cores
must be within the scope of, for instance, an illocutionary force (IF) operator;
thus the interrogative operator has both cores in its scope, as in ‘Must Joan
believe Hiro to be able to accomplish the task?’.
If one core is embedded in the other, the linkage type is core subordination. A diagnostic test for embeddedness at the core level is whether or not
there is an argument shared by both conjuncts. In core subordination, there is
no shared argument: the embedded core as a whole — not an argument within
it — is an argument of the matrix core, e.g. ‘Joan denounced Hiro’s stealing
the car’ and ‘Joan’s losing the election surprised everyone’ (the embedded
core is highlighted in bold face). It is the embedded core, not Hiro or Joan
alone, which functions as an argument of the matrix core in these sentences.
If there is no embedding, the linked cores will share at least one core
1 Serial verb constructions can also involve nuclear juncture. See Olson (1981) for
the distinction between core-level and nuclear-level serial constructions.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
argument. The grammatical phenomenon of control (as in the so-called EQUI
constructions) is in part accounted for in RRG by this argument-sharing
mechanism. In English, there are subject-control and object-control EQUI
constructions, e.g. ‘Joan promised Hiro to leave early’ and ‘Joan persuaded
Hiro to leave early,’ respectively. In general, Japanese (like English) permits
both types of control; however, in core-level TE-linkage with a shared argument the controller is always the subject.
Non-embedded cores are either in core cosubordination, if one core is
dependent on the other as regards a core-level operator, or in core coordination, if there is no operator-dependency at the core level. Therefore, in order
to distinguish cosubordination and coordination, it is necessary to examine
operator dependency at the core level. Three types of core operators are
posited in RRG, yielding three potential diagnostics: internal negation, directionals, and root modals. In Chapter 2, it was pointed out that while nai-de
functions as the negation operator at the nuclear level, naku-te and zu are
negation operators at the core level. This in fact turns out to be the only one of
the three core-operator diagnostics that is applicable in Japanese. Core-level
directionals are not grammaticized in Japanese and hence are not operators at
all. As for root modals, concepts expressed by root modals in many languages are generally expressed in Japanese by complex constructions — e.g.
V-nak-ere-ba nara-na- ‘must; (lit.) if not V, it cannot be’. To be sure, Japanese does have genuine root modals (i.e. lexicalized root-modality expressions), e.g. the desideratives -ta- and -tagar- ‘want’ (desiderative); however,
these desideratives also encode evidential meanings, which properly belong
to the clause level. The subject of a predicate involving -ta- is the speaker (in
assertions) or the addressee (in questions), whereas that of -tagar- must be
third-person (the literal translation of -tagar- is ‘show a sign of wanting to
V’). These desiderative operators thus encode information similar to that
which person markers express. Beyond that, they are evidentials: they indicate how the speaker has obtained the information, whether by virtue of
himself/herself being the wanter or by inference based on detecting signs of
someone else’s desire.2 Because these functions are evidential, -ta- and
-tagar- must be regarded not only as core operators but also as clausal operators. In fact, the scope of a root-modal/evidential can vary from sentence
to sentence. Therefore, root modals will not be further considered in this
study as diagnostics of nexus type in core juncture.
TE can be used to link cores in all three nexus types. Section 1 investigates core subordination, in which the TE-marked core as a whole is an
2 See Aoki (1986) for the argument that these morphemes are evidential markers.
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
147
argument of the second core. Section 2 is devoted to the non-embedded
nexus types, cosubordination and coordination. It is argued that although
identical at first sight, these two nexus types behave differently with respect to
the negative operator naku-te. Section 3 discusses how the distinction between core coordination and core cosubordination is directly reflected in their
semantics. While in core coordination both cores are used to assert separate
propositions in declarative sentences, in core cosubordination the first core
functions as an adverbial modifier. Section 4 summarizes the chapter.
1.
CORE SUBORDINATION
Some verbals take a TE-linked core as a whole as an argument (henceforth
TE-argument), e.g. i- ‘be permitted’, daizyoobu + COP ‘be all right’, and sum‘be settled’, as illustrated in (1).
(1) a.anata wa
moo
kaette
ii.
you TOP already go.home-TE be.permitted-NPST
‘You may go home now.’
b. koko de
tabako
o
sutte
ii.
here LOC cigarette ACC smoke-TE be.permitted-NPST
‘It is permitted to smoke here.’
c.anata wa ko-naku-te
daizyoobu desu.
you TOP come-NEG-TE all.right
COP(POL)-NPST
‘It is all right that you don’t come.’
(McGloin 1976)
d. kyoo wa
kaimono ni
ika-naku-te sunda.
today TOP shopping CMPL go-NEG-TE was.settled
‘(I) didn’t have to go shopping today.’
(ibid.)
A preliminary comment is necessary to forestall possible confusion regarding
the identity and grammatical category of i- ‘be permitted’. I- in (1a,b) must
not be confused with the homonymous i- ‘be good’, shown in (2).
(2) zyoon
wa
akarukute
be.cheerful-TE
‘Joan is cheerful and nice.’
TOP
ii.
be.good-NPST
I- ‘be good’ may be modified by a degree adverbial, e.g. totemo ‘very’ (3a),
but i- ‘be permitted’ in (3b) cannot be.
(3) a.zyoon
wa
TOP
akarukute
totemo ii.
be.cheerful-TE very
is.good-NPST
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘Joan is cheerful and very nice.’
b.*koko de tabako
o
sutte
here LOC cigarette ACC smoke-TE
‘It is totally permitted to smoke here.’
totemo ii.
very
is.permitted-NPST
[intended]
Furthermore, the negative form of i- ‘be good’ is yoku-na- (4a,b), whereas the
negation of i- ‘be permitted’ is expressed as ike-na- (4c).
(4) a.kono ringo
wa
hurukute
yokunai.
this apple TOP be.old-TE is.not.good
‘This apple is old and not good.’
b. koko de
tabako
o
sutte
here LOC cigarette ACC smoke-TE
‘It is not good to smoke here.’
wa
TOP
yokunai.
is.not.good
c.koko de tabako
o
sutte
wa
ikenai.
here LOC cigarette ACC smoke-TE TOP is.not.permitted
‘It is not permitted to smoke here.’
Although these two i-’s exhibit distinct morphosyntactic characteristics
— and thus must be considered homonymous rather than polysemous — their
meanings do overlap, and in the affirmative form it is not always clear which
i- is intended. When they are in the negative form, however, the formal
difference between these two i-’s enables the semantic differences between
them to emerge more clearly. For example, (4b) with i- ‘be good’ is used to
express the speaker’s opinion that cigarette-smoking is not appropriate in the
location, whereas (4c) with i- ‘be permitted’ conveys the much stronger
notion of prohibition by some external authority.
The negative form ik-e-na-, with linking vowel e, is unique to i- ‘be
permitted’. That is, regarding the linking vowel, this morphological (suppletive) alternation is not available to other adjectives; all other adjectives
conjugate in the same way as i- ‘be good’, yok-u-na-, with linking vowel u.
The question, then, arises as to whether i- ‘be permitted’ is appropriately to be
categorized as an adjective at all. The alternative is to categorize it as a
root-modal operator. This, however, must be rejected because ike-na- can
appear as a main predicate, e.g. (5), something which is not permitted with
operators.3
3 Recall that in RRG an operator must be a closed-class grammatical morpheme of
limited distribution (Chapter 2 §3). The operator thus is a morphosyntactic notion,
not a functional one. Although adjectives in certain constructions (e.g. it is necessary
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
(5)
149
ziipan wa
ikenai.
jeans
TOP
is.not.permitted
‘Jeans are not permitted.’
Insofar as only a small number of particles, e.g. wa and mo, can intervene between the TE-predicate and such predicates as i- ‘be permitted’,
daizyoobu + COP ‘be all right’, and sum- ‘be settled’, these sequences resemble those in nuclear juncture. However, as remarked, there is a crucial
difference between core and nuclear juncture. While only the nuclear negative-operator, nai-de, can appear on the first predicate in nuclear juncture, e.g.
(6a), not only nai-de but also the core negative-operator naku-te may negate
the first conjunct (the nucleus or the core) in core juncture, as shown in (6b)
and (1c,d). Figures 1 and 2 below illustrate these two contrasting TE-linkage
types.
(6) a.zyoon
wa
sigoto o
si- {nai-de/*naku-te} iru.
work
ACC
do NEG-TE
be-NPST
‘Joan isn’t working.’
(Nuclear Subordination)
TOP
b. zyoon
wa
sigoto o
si- {nai-de/naku-te} ii.
work
ACC
do NEG-TE
is.permitted
‘Joan is permitted not to work.’
(Core Subordination)
TOP
TE-arguments have usually been analyzed in the literature in the same
way as clausal complements, the latter illustrated in (7).
(7) a.zyoon
wa
hiro
ga
gakkoo o
yameru
to
itta.
school ACC quit-NPST QUOT said
‘Joan said Hiro will quit school.’
TOP
b. zyoon
ga
NOM
NOM
hiro
o
ACC
semeta
condemned
no
ga
NMLZ
NOM
yoku-na-i.
is.not.good
‘It is not good that Joan condemned Hiro.’
that) can be used to express a concept similar to that which an operator expresses,
such adjectives are not themselves considered to be operators.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
SENTENCE
LDP
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
NP
zyoon wa sigoto o
si-
nai-de i- ru
NUC
NEG
NUC
ASP
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 1: Nuclear Subordination
SENTENCE
LDP
CLAUSE
CORE
ARG
NUC
CORE
NP
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
zyoon wa sigoto o
si-
PRED
naku-te
NUC
CORE
i-
i
NUC
NEG
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 2: Core Subordination
However, there are major structural differences between the two construction
types. Although both (6b) and (7) involve embedding, the juncture level in
(7) is not the core level. In (6b), the subordinate unit can never be accompanied by the clausal operator of tense, whereas in (7) it
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
151
SENTENCE
LDP
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
NP
CMPL
CORE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
PRED
zyoon wa hiro ga gakkoo o yame-
ru daroo to
it-
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
TNS
CLAUSE
ta
CLAUSE
TNS
STAT
FIGURE 3: Clausal (Complement) Subordination
must be.4 Similarly, evidentials (clausal operators), e.g. daroo (presumptive) and
rasi- ‘it appears to be’, can appear in a true subordinate clause, e.g. (8),
whereas such operators can never appear with a subordinate core.
(8) a.zyoon
wa
hiro
ga
TOP
NOM
gakkoo o
yameru
daroo
school ACC quit-NPST EVID
to
itta.
said
‘Joan said Hiro would quit school.’
QUOT
b. zyoon
ga
NOM
hiro
o
ACC
semeta
condemned
rasii
no
EVID-NPST
NMLZ
ga
ki ni naru.
worries
‘It worries (me) that Joan seems to have condemned Hiro.’
NOM
These differences are reflected in two very different RRG structures, as can be
4 The interpretation of tense operators in embedded clauses is relative rather than
absolute — i.e., the tense of the embedded clause is interpreted as being either prior
(past tense) or not prior (nonpast tense) to the referent time expressed by the matrix
clause. See Ôkawa (1990) and references therein for the interpretation of tense in
subordinate clauses.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
seen by comparing Figure 2 (p.154), which illustrates core subordination,
with Figure 3 above, illustrating clausal subordination.
2.
NON-EMBEDDED NEXUS TYPES
In core-level TE-linkage with non-embedded nexus, the subject must be
shared by both cores. In this sense this linkage type resembles VP-linkage in
other syntactic theories, e.g. Lexical Functional Grammar as described in
Sells (1990). RRG presents the linkage from a different perspective: the
shared argument serves as the pivot around which two cores are conjoined.
The pivot of a syntactic construction is the NP which plays the most significant role in the construction (Foley and Van Valin 1984). For example, in the
‘raising’ constructions the pivot is the NP which is ‘raised’ from the embedded to the matrix clause (9a,b); in the ‘EQUI’ constructions it is the NP which
is deleted under coreferentiality with the matrix subject (9c); in the participial
relative clauses it is the NP which must be (i) coreferential with the head noun
and (ii) omitted in the relative clause (9d).
(9) a.Joan seems to have passed the exam.
(Raising to subject)
b. Joan expects Hiro to pass the exam.
(Raising to object)
c.Joan wants to go to college.
(EQUI)
d. The woman talking with Hiro is Joan’s mother. (Participial relative)
The following sentence exemplifies non-embedded core linkage with TE.5
(10) zyoon ga
okane o
tamete
kuruma o
katta
koto
money ACC save-TE car
ACC bought fact
a.‘the fact that Joan bought a car by saving money.’
b. ‘the fact that Joan saved money and bought a car’
NOM
The nexus in (10) is potentially ambiguous between core cosubordination and core coordination. With core cosubordination, the utterance is in5 In most examples in this subsection, I felt it would be clearer to formulate the
example with the nominative ga rather than the topic marker wa, so that the subject
NP would be clearly inside the core (and not in the LDP). However, in main clauses,
because such an NP is shared by both cores, it would be much more natural to use wa,
which overtly indicates intrasentential topic continuity. In subordinate clauses, on
the other hand, wa cannot be used to mark topic; ga is natural and in fact obligatory.
(See Chapter 2 §2 for brief discussion of wa and ga.) Accordingly, all the examples
below are presented as subordinate clauses; the clauses have all been nominalized
with koto ‘fact/(abstract) thing’, although I have not provided a matrix clause for the
examples.
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
153
terpreted as asserting a single proposition specified by the second core, with
the first core functioning as an adverbial modifier, e.g. indicating a MEANS as
in (10a). With core coordination, by contrast, the utterance is interpreted as
asserting two propositions.
This ambiguity becomes apparent when the negative morpheme is attached to the second predicate, as shown in (11); (11a) and (11b) are superficially identical, but the interpretation is different.
(11) a.zyoon
ga
okane o
tamete
kuruma o
money ACC save-TE car
ACC
kawa- nakatta koto
buy
NEG-PST fact
‘the fact that Joan bought a car without saving money’
(Cosubordination)
NOM
b. zyoon ga okane o tamete kuruma o kawa-nakatta koto
‘the fact that Joan saved money and didn’t buy a car’
(Coordination)
The ambiguity between (11a) and (11b) is structural, although it need
not surface phonetically.6 In (11a) both cores are within the scope of negation; in (11b) only the second core is. This phenomenon can be stated in
terms of operator dependency. As shown in (12), the first core in (11a) is
dependent on the second with regard to the core-level negative operator: both
cores are in the scope of the negative operator. By contrast, there is no operator dependency in (11b): only the second core is in the scope of the negative operator. Thus, the former case represents core cosubordination, while
the latter represents core coordination.
(12) A: Core Cosubordination (11a)
[CORE [CORE zyoon ga okane o tamete ] [CORE kuruma o kaw-]]-NEG
B: Core Coordination
(11b)
[CORE zyoon ga okane o tamete ] [CORE kuruma o kaw-]-NEG
Figures 4 and 5 below give the RRG structures for core cosubordination and
core coordination.
6 A major-phrase boundary is more likely to occur in the b-clauses than in the
a-clauses; however, this is only a tendency and may fail to be observed in naturally
uttered sentences.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
NP
PRED
zyoon ga okane o tamete
kuruma o kawa- nakat- ta
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CORE
NEG
CLAUSE
TNS
FIGURE 4: Core Cosubordination
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
CORE
ARG
ARG
NUC
ARG
NUC
NP
NP
PRED
NP
PRED
zyoon ga okane o tamete
kuruma o kawa- nakat- ta
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
NEG
TNS
FIGURE 5: Core Coordination7
The negation operator NEG is attached to the conjoined core in the operator
projection in Figure 4, but only to the second core in Figure 5.
7 Because there is no core-level operator dependency in coordination, no super
CORE-node appears in the operator projection.
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
155
Note that although in core cosubordination the scope of the negation
ranges over both cores, what is negated is not the two propositions but rather
the semantic relation between them. That is, the clause in Figure 4 (=11a)
does not indicate ‘Joan didn’t save money and didn’t buy a car’; rather, it
indicates that the proposition ‘Joan bought a car by saving money’ does not
hold. This resembles the wide-scope reading of the following English sentence (13), which can be paraphrased as ‘It is not the case that Joan was
promoted because she is nice to her staff’ or ‘The reason why Joan was
promoted is not because she is nice to her staff.’ When both clauses in (13)
are in the scope of negation, what is negated is the semantic relation CAUSE
expressed by because.
(13)
Joan didn’t get promoted because she’s nice to her staff.8
The negative operators nai-de and naku-te have been studied by several
researchers (McGloin 1972, 1976; Kitagawa 1976; Suzuki 1976; Takasaki
1984), yet so far no really satisfactory characterization of their distribution
and semantics has emerged. It is one of the merits of RRG that it can provide
such a characterization. RRG states that in core cosubordination, a first core
cannot be independently negated by a core-level operator, whereas in core
coordination, it can be. Thus, naku-te signals coordination at the core level.
This characterization dovetails perfectly with the observed behavior of nai-de
and naku-te and provides an explanation of that behavior. In (14), for example, because the core-level operator naku-te is attached to the first core, it
cannot be parsed as core cosubordination, and the sentence therefore must
express two separate events.
(14)
zyoon
ga
NOM
okane o
money ACC
tamesave
naku-te
NEG-TE
kuruma
car
o
ACC
katta
koto
bought fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t save money and bought a car (instead)’
(parsed as core coordination; two separate events)
NOT: ‘the fact that Joan bought a car without saving money’
(parsed as core cosubordination)
In either nexus type, however, the first core can contain the nuclear-level
operator nai-de, as shown below.
8 Recall the brief discussion of this sentence in Chapter 2 §3. For a detailed analysis
of sentences like (13), see Kay (1991).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
tame-
-nai-de
kuruma o
NUC
katNUC
CORE
CORE
Because it is a nuclear operator, when nai-de appears on the first predicate it
does not provide any information about the nexus type of the core linkage, so
that the resultant phrase will be ambiguous between cosubordination and
coordination. The sentences in (15) confirm this prediction. Note that the
corresponding clause with naku-te is not ambiguous, as shown in (14).
(15)
zyoon
ga
NOM
okane o
money ACC
tame-nai-de
save-NEG-TE
kuruma
car
o
ACC
katta
koto
bought fact
a.‘the fact that Joan bought a car without saving money’
(parsed as core cosubordination)
b. ‘the fact that Joan didn’t save money and bought a car (instead)’
(parsed as core coordination)
As mentioned, the utterance with core cosubordination is interpreted as
asserting a single proposition specified by the second core, and the first core
functions as an adverbial; the utterance with core coordination is interpreted
as asserting two propositions. Because saving money and buying a car are
naturally independent events, (15) permits both interpretations. For the same
reason, the use of naku-te in (14), which signals coordination nexus, is acceptable.
On the other hand, (16a) is not readily taken as ambiguous: the preferred
interpretation (and for many speakers the only interpretation) is A. That is,
the sentence is not naturally parsed as involving coordination. This is because
buying a ticket and seeing a movie can hardly be conceived as independent
events. Eega o mi- ‘see movie’ immediately evokes the interpretive frame
which contains an event of buying a ticket.9 With no further information, the
9 Interpretive frames are organizers of experience and tools for understanding.
Fillmore (1985b:232) notes: ‘Interpretive frames can be introduced into the process
of understanding a text through being invoked by the interpreter or through being
evoked by the text. A frame is invoked when the interpreter, in trying to make sense
of a text segment, is able to assign it an interpretation by situating its content in a
pattern that is known independently of the text. A frame is evoked by the text if some
linguistic form or pattern is conventionally associated with the frame in question. For
example, the sentence “We never open our presents until the morning” makes no
mention of Christmas, yet interpreters who share certain cultural experiences would
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
157
use of naku-te in (16b) (i.e. core coordination) is unnatural for just the same
reason: given the interpretive frame, the events are hard to construe as mutually independent. However, if the sentence is uttered in a context where
Joan was supposed to buy a ticket for, say, a concert but spent the money for
a movie instead, (16b) becomes natural.
(16) a.zyoon ga
NOM
kippu o
kawa-nai-de eega
o
mita
ticket ACC buy-NEG-TE movie ACC saw
koto
fact
A: ‘the fact that Joan saw the movie without buying a ticket’
B: ‘the fact that Joan didn’t buy the ticket and saw a movie (instead)’
b. zyoon ga kippu o
kawa-naku-te eega
o
mita koto
pay-NEG-TE
movie ACC saw fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t buy the ticket and saw a movie (instead)’
Nai-de can also be interpreted as ‘by (means of) not V-ing’, as illustrated
in (17a,b).
(17) a. zyoon
ga
gohan o
tabe-nai-de taizyuu
o
meal
ACC
eat-NEG-TE body.weight ACC
herasita koto
reduced fact
‘the fact that Joan reduced her body weight by not eating meals’
NOM
a.
zyoon
ga
doryoku o
si-nai-de
taizyuu
effort
ACC
do-NEG-TE body.weight
o
herasita koto
ACC
reduced fact
‘the fact that Joan reduced her body weight without making an
effort’
NOM
b.
zyoon
ga
NOM
mudazukai
wasting
o
ACC
si-nai-de
do-NEG-TE
okane o
money ACC
tameta koto
saved fact
immediately (in the terminology suggested here) invoke a Christmas context; replace
the simple noun presents with Christmas presents and we have introduced a word
which evokes that same context.’ For concepts similar to the interpretive frame, see
Minsky (1975), Schank (1975, 1980), Schank and Abelson (1977), and Schank and
Riesbeck (1981).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘the fact that Joan saved money by not being wasteful’
b.
zyoon
ga
NOM
mokuteki
purpose
o
ACC
mota-nai-de
have-NEG-TE
okane o
money ACC
tameta koto
saved fact
‘the fact that Joan saved money without having a purpose’
The distinction between the ‘by not V-ing’ and the ‘without V-ing’ interpretation seems to be purely pragmatic. If performing the first action would
normally prevent the accomplishment of the second action, e.g. (17a,b), the
interpreter is likely to construe the clause with ‘by not V-ing’. ‘Without
V-ing’ interpretations are generally more natural when there is no such presupposition, e.g. (17a,b).
Because the first core serves as an adverbial modifier in core cosubordination, it is frequently claimed that the first core is subordinated. Although
the ‘subordinate’ status of the first core is indeed justified on semantic
grounds, there is no evidence for its syntactic subordination. A subordinate
core must by definition be an argument of the matrix core in RRG; adverbials
are not valence-bound, and thus they fall outside the core.
To sum up, TE can link cores in all three nexus types. In core subordination, the subordinate core as a whole is an argument and is governed by
the matrix predicate; the lexicon must supply the information as to the particular predicates that can take a TE-marked core as an argument. With other
predicates, sentences involving TE-linked cores do not involve subordination
but are potentially ambiguous between coordination and cosubordination.
The interpreter must select the appropriate reading based on considerations of
discourse context and interpretive frames.
3.
SEMANTIC RELATIONS IN NON-EMBEDDED CORE
JUNCTURE
3.1.
Core Coordination
As discussed in the previous section, coordinated cores are independent of
each other syntactically as well as semantically, and thus a declarative clause
containing coordinated cores is used to assert two propositions. Although
various semantic relations can be inferred from the meanings of the linked
cores, this TE-linkage does not uniquely signify any particular semantic relation. In fact, the linkage can be used as a purely structural device, to conjoin
two or more cores with no further semantic overtones. In such a case, subject
sharing is the only requirement for this linkage type, as illustrated in (18).
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
159
(18) otooto
wa
daigakusee
de
kodomo no
younger.brother TOP college.student COP-TE child
GEN
toki yoku kenka
site
uindo-saahuin ga
suki
time often quarrel do-TE windsurfing
NOM fond.of
de
kyonen itaria e
itte...
COP-TE
last.year Italy ALL go-TE
‘My younger brother is a college student and quarreled a lot when
(he was) a child and likes windsurfing and went to Italy last year and
...’
In this respect, TE-linkage parallels and-linkage in English. As Halliday and
Hasan (1976:233) argue (cf. Chapter 1 §3.2), an adult English speaker treats
and as a structural but not a cohesive device: it may be utilized solely to keep
the floor. On the other hand, the discourse context may provide a cue to
determine the speaker’s motivation for using and or TE. As discussed in
Chapter 1 §2.3.4, for example, if the interlocutors are talking about customers’ payment statuses, the reason for conjoining multiple propositions is
transparent: a list of customers’ payments. TE is used for this purpose in (19).
(19) abe-san
wa
asita
haratte bandoo-san wa
tomorrow pay-TE
TOP
sensyuu
haratte dan-san wa
raisyuu
haratte
last.week pay-TE
TOP
next.week pay-TE
endoo-san wa kinoo
haraimasita.
TOP yesterday
paid(POL)
‘Abe will pay tomorrow, Bandô paid last week, Dan will pay next
week, and Endô paid yesterday.’
TOP
However, when only two cores or clauses are linked by TE, the hearer
inevitably interprets them as bearing a certain semantic relation to one another, and does not take TE as a mere structural device. For example, when
the predicates of the linked cores are not stative, a SEQUENCE reading is the
unmarked interpretation.
(20) zyoon
ga
terebi
o
NOM
TV
ACC
mite
watch-TE
ohuro
bath
ni
LOC
haitta
entered
koto
fact
‘the fact that Joan watched TV and took a bath’
The natural interpretation of (20) is that Joan watched TV and then took a
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
bath. However, this SEQUENCE interpretation is to be attributed in part to the
iconicity between clause order and intended temporal order (Haiman 1980,
1985), rather than solely to the TE-linkage itself. If the linked cores are
stative, on the other hand, no SEQUENCE can be inferred, e.g. (21).
(21) zyoon
ga
akarukute
sinsetu na
be.cheerful-TE kind
COP
‘The fact that Joan is cheerful and kind’
NOM
koto
fact
Because TE-linkage in core coordination merely signals that two denoted events are independent of each other in the sense that neither is ‘part’ of
the other, it permits CAUSE interpretations. In (22a), for example, the reason
for Joan’s firing is her embezzlement. As shown in (22b), the negative operator does not have the first core in its scope — a characteristic feature of
coordination nexus.
(22) a.zyoon ga
tukaikomi
o
site
kubi ni natta koto
embezzlement ACC do-TE was.fired
fact
‘the fact that Joan embezzled and got fired’
NOM
b. zyoon ga tukaikomi o site
kubi ni nara-nakatta
do-TE was.not.fired
‘the fact that Joan embezzled but didn’t get fired’
NOT: ‘the fact that Joan got fired without embezzlement’
koto
fact
In Chapter 6, we will examine the semantic relations CAUSE and REASON in
detail; the present subsection will merely present some facts about those
relations when they are expressed by core-coordination TE-linkage. A
CAUSE relation can be inferred only when the second core denotes a
non-action. In (22) the first core denotes an action and the second a
non-action; in (23) both cores denote non-actions; in both cases, a CAUSE
interpretation is permitted.10
(23) a.zyoon
ga
naibu-koosoo ni
yaburete
internal-strife DAT be.defeated-TE
kubi ni natta koto
was.fired
fact
‘the fact that Joan was defeated in the internal (power) struggle
and got fired’
NOM
10 When both cores denote actions, no CAUSE interpretation is possible. See Chapter
6 for details.
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
b. zyoon
161
ga
asi o
otte
byooin
ni
leg ACC break-TE hospital LOC
hakobareta koto
was.carried fact
‘the fact that Joan broke (her) leg and was carried to the hospital’
NOM
When the first core denotes a non-action and the second an action, the
non-action is considered to be the REASON for the action, e.g. (24).
(24) a.zyoon
ga
rakudai site gakkoo o
yameta koto
fail-TE
school ACC quit-PST fact
‘the fact that Joan failed (in an examination) and quit school’
NOM
b. risoo ni
kyoomee site, ... 12-nin no
wakamono
idea LOC sympathize-TE
GEN
young.people
ga
kaihatutozyookoku e
tabidatta.
[Borantia]
NOM developing.country ALL
left.for
‘Sympathizing with (his) ideals, 12 young volunteers went to
developing countries.’
When the first core denotes a non-action and the second an action which is
contrary to expectation, TE-linkage also permits a CONCESSIVE relation, e.g.
(25).11
(25) a.kare wa
sono koto o
sitte ite
iwanai.
he
TOP
that fact ACC know-TE does.not.say
‘He knows the fact but doesn’t say (it).’
(Morita 1980)
b. zyoon
wa
okane o
motte ite
money ACC have-TE
‘Joan has money but doesn’t lend (it).’
TOP
c.zyoon
wa
TOP
kasanai.
does.not.lend
uso da
to
sitte ite
watasi
lie COP-NPST QUOT know-TE I
ni
osieta.
told
‘Joan knew that (it) was a lie but told (it) to me nevertheless.’
LOC
When a CONCESSIVE relation is intended, the second core is frequently
11 Sitte ite (25a,c) and motte ite (25b) themselves involve nuclear-level TE-linkage;
however, because nuclear linkage is irrelevant to the current discussion, I have not
indicated this in the glosses.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
negated, e.g. (25a,b); but if the co-occurrence of the two events is strongly
contrary to cultural/social expectations, e.g. (25c), the second core may be
affirmative.
The fact that core-coordination TE-linkage is compatible with both
CAUSE and REASON, on the one hand, and with their ‘opposite’ CONCESSIVE, on the other, suggests that these semantic relations are inferred rather
than asserted. With a CAUSE or REASON relation, the subject of the first
constituent need not be identical with that of the second, and accordingly,
these relations may be implicated by clause-level TE-linkage as well as by
core linkage. However, unlike core TE-linkage, CONCESSIVE relations
cannot be implicated by clause-level TE-linkage, as we will see in Chapter 6.
3.2.
Core Cosubordination
TE-linkage in core cosubordination signals adverbial modification without
further specification as to which particular adverbial function (i.e. semantic
relation) should hold between the cosubordinate and the matrix core. Several
taxonomies of adverbial functions compatible with TE-linkage have been
proposed (NLRI 1951, Negishi 1970, Morita 1980, Endô 1982). These
hitherto-proposed taxonomies do not distinguish either juncture or nexus
types; nonetheless, most of them appear to recognize MANNER 12 and
MEANS relations corresponding to what we call TE-linkage with core
cosubordination.
Rather than summarizing such taxonomies of semantic relations, this
subsection will compare core-cosubordination TE-linkage with de-marked
NPs. De is diachronically related to TE (Konoshima 1966, 1983; Komatsu
1981), 13 and de-marked NPs (NP-de) can denote semantic relations compatible with those expressed by TE-linkage. Because no predicate has an
NP-de in its valence, however, all NP-de’s are considered to be adverbials. As
with TE-linkage, NP-de’s hold various semantic relations to their predicates,
12 The commonly used term in Japanese is yootai. Yootai denotes a very general
concept, corresponding to aspect, appearance, condition, phase, feature, way,
manner, etc. I have selected the term manner to label this semantic relation.
13 It is widely accepted that connective particles in Japanese (ga, o, ni, to) developed
from the corresponding case particles (Ishigaki 1955; Komatsu 1981; Hirose 1991;
Ôhori 1991, 1992). In the case of TE, however, the development was the reverse, so
that some case-particle de’s in fact are derived from the connective TE, via two paths:
ni-te ‘COP+TE’ and zu-te ‘NEG+TE’ (Konoshima 1966).
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
163
viz. LOCATIVE, MEANS, MATERIAL, MANNER, MEASURE, and CAUSE.14
Generally, when the adverbial function of an NP-de is not easily inferable from the meanings of the NP and the predicate, or when the speaker
wants to be more precise, s/he can replace the NP-de with a TE-predicate in
core linkage. This fact indicates that TE and de are related not only diachronically but also synchronically (i.e. psychologically). The selection of
TE-predicate in such paraphrasing is, of course, semantically restricted, and
generally the least marked TE-predicate of the appropriate semantic field is
selected. The following sentences illustrate the parallelism between NP-de’s
and TE-linked cores.
(26)
LOCATIVE
a.zyoon
ga
noodosutoroomu
kutu o
katta
koto
shoes ACC bought fact
‘the fact that Joan bought shoes at Nordstrom’
NOM
a. zyoon
ga
de
PRT
noodosutoroomu
NOM
e
ALL
itte
go-TE
kutu
shoes
o
ACC
katta
koto
bought fact
‘the fact that Joan bought shoes going to Nordstrom’
b. soto
de
hanasi-masyoo.
outside PRT talk-HORT(POL)
‘Let’s talk outside.’
b. soto
ni
dete
hanasi-masyoo.
outside LOC go.out-TE talk-HORT(POL)
‘Let’s go outside and talk.’
(27)
MEANS
a.zyoon
ga
NOM
teepu
tape
de
kankokugo o
benkyoo sita
Korean
ACC
studied
PRT
koto
14 A clause can contain multiple NP-de’s if they hold different semantic relations to
the predicate — e.g. CAUSE-de and LOCATIVE-de commonly co-occur in the same
clause, as do MANNER-de and MEANS-de. Thus there are many homonymous de’s in
Japanese. However, MEANS and MATERIAL NP-de’s can never co-occur in a single
clause; hence these relations are considered not to be distinct.
164
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
fact
‘the fact that Joan studied Korean with tapes’
a. zyoon
ga
o
NOM
teepu o
kiite
kankokugo
tape
ACC listen-TE
Korean
benkyoo sita koto
studied
fact
‘the fact that Joan studied Korean listening to tapes’
b. kuruma de
itta
koto
car
PRT
went fact
‘the fact that (I) went (there) by car’
ACC
b. kuruma o
unten site itta
koto
car
ACC drive-TE
went fact
‘the fact that (I) went (there) by driving a car’
(28)
MATERIAL
a.zyoon
ga
renga de
ie
o
tateta koto
brick PRT house ACC built
fact
‘the fact that Joan built a house with bricks’
a. zyoon ga
renga o
tukatte ie
o
tateta
NOM brick
ACC use-TE
house ACC built
koto
fact
‘the fact that Joan built a house using bricks’
NOM
As remarked, MEANS and MATERIAL NP-de’s cannot co-occur in a single
clause. Therefore, should it be desired to express both NPs, one of them must
be encoded with a TE-linked core, e.g. (29).
(29)a. # zyoon
ga
densirenzi
de okome de
keeki
microwave.oven PRT rice
PRT
cake
o
tukutta koto
ACC
made
fact
‘the fact that Joan made cake with rice with a microwave oven’
[intended]
NOM
a. zyoon
ga
NOM
densirenzi
microwave.oven
o
ACC
tukatte
use-TE
okome
rice
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
165
de
keeki o
tukutta koto
cake
ACC
made fact
‘the fact that Joan made cake with rice using a microwave oven’
PRT
a. zyoon
ga
densirenzi
de
okome o
microwave.oven PRT rice
ACC
tukatte keeki o
tukutta koto
use-TE
cake
ACC
made fact
‘the fact that Joan made cake using rice with a microwave oven’
NOM
(30)
MANNER
a.zyoon
ga
akai huku de
osoosiki ni
kita koto
red cloth PRT funeral
LOC
came fact
‘the fact that Joan came to the funeral in a red dress’
NOM
a. zyoon
ga
NOM
akai
red
huku o
cloth ACC
kite
osoosiki
wear-TE funeral
kita koto
came fact
‘the fact that Joan came to the funeral wearing a red dress’
b. sakadati
de
aruita
koto
handstand PRT walked fact
‘the fact that (I) walked on (my) hands’
b. sakadati
site
aruita
koto
handstand do-TE walked fact
‘the fact that (I) walked standing on (my) hands’
(31)
MEASURE
a.zenbu de
3,000 en.
all
PRT
yen
‘All for 3,000 yen.’
a. zenbu kutte 3,000 en.
(Morita 1980)
all
eat-TE
yen
‘All (you can) eat for 3,000 yen.’
b. mikka
de
siageta
koto
three.days PRT completed fact
‘the fact that (I) completed (it) in three days’
ni
LOC
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
b. mikka
kakete
siageta
koto
three.days spend-TE completed fact
‘the fact that (I) completed (it) spending three days’
(32)
CAUSE15
a.zyoon
ga
tukaikomi
de
kubi ni natta koto
embezzlement PRT was.fired
fact
‘the fact that Joan was fired for embezzlement’
NOM
a. zyoon ga
tukaikomi
o
site
embezzlement ACC do-TE
‘the fact that Joan embezzled and got fired’
NOM
kubi ni natta koto
was.fired
fact
(= 22a)
b. hune no
kekkoo
de
okureta.
ferry GEN suspension.of.service PRT was.late
‘(I) was late due to the suspension of the ferry service.’
b. hune ga
kekkoo
site
okureta.
ferry NOM suspension.of.service do-TE was.late
Lit. ‘The ferry service being suspended, (I) was late.’
‘Because the ferry service was suspended, (I) was late.’
In TE-linkage expressing the LOCATIVE, MEANS, and MANNER relations, the subject of the two conjuncts must be identical. This makes some
sense semantically. In order for a person to perform some action in some
place, the same person must first go there (LOCATIVE); similarly, one typically does something in order to accomplish something else ( MEANS); and
one often does something while doing something else (or after doing something else whose resultant state remains when the second action is performed;
MANNER). Only core-level TE-linkage automatically involves such coreferential construal. If the subjects are distinct, the above relations cannot be
conveyed via TE-linkage. In the CAUSE relation, however, the subject of the
CAUSE clause need not be identical with that of the EFFECT clause — again a
semantically reasonable state of affairs — and so the juncture can easily be at
the clause level, e.g. (32b). MEASURE NPs differ from these two types in
that, when such NPs are used predicatively, there is generally no subject.
MEASURE NPs are inherently adverbial, not expressing propositions. Thus
15 Because the CAUSE relation can be expressed by an NP-de, it is included in this
subsection along with the other adverbial relations even though it involves core
coordination rather than core cosubordination.
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
167
MEASURE NPs are relatively difficult to paraphrase with TE-linkage.
When a negative operator applies to the second core — except (32a),
which is in core coordination as discussed in the previous section, and (36b),
which involves clausal juncture — the resultant interpretation indicates that
all the above paraphrases with TE-linkage are clearly in core cosubordination.
That is, the first core (as well as the second) must be in the scope of negation,
just as the corresponding NP-de must be. If the sentence permits both
cosubordination and coordination readings, it is only the former which can be
paralleled by the corresponding NP-de. The following provide some examples.
(33)
LOCATIVE
a.zyoon ga
noodosutoroomu
NOM
de
PRT
kutu o
shoes ACC
kawa-nakat-ta koto
did.not.buy fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t buy shoes at Nordstrom’
a. zyoon ga
NOM
noodosutoroomu
e
ALL
itte
go-TE
kutu o
shoes ACC
kawa-nakat-ta koto
did.not.buy
fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t go to Nordstrom and buy shoes’
NOT: ‘the fact that Joan went to Nordstrom and/but didn’t buy shoes’
MEANS
b. zyoon
ga
teepu de
kankokugo o
benkyoo
tape
PRT
Korean
ACC
study
si-nakat-ta koto
did.not.do fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t study Korean by listening to tapes’
NOM
b. zyoon
ga
o
NOM
teepu o
kiite
kankokugo
tape
ACC listen-TE
Korean
benkyoo si-nakat-ta koto
study
did.not.do fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t study Korean listening to tapes’
ACC
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
NOT: ‘the fact that Joan studied Korean without listening to tapes’
MANNER
c.zyoon
ga
NOM
akai huku de
osoosiki ni ko-nakat-ta
red cloth PRT funeral
LOC did.not.come
koto
fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t come to the funeral in a red dress’
c. zyoon
ga
akai huku o
kite
osoosiki ni
red cloth ACC wear-TE funeral
LOC
ko-nakat-ta
koto
did.not.come fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t come to the funeral wearing a red dress’
NOT: ‘the fact that Joan came to the funeral without wearing a red dress’
NOM
If the first core and not the second is negated, then the first core in
(33a-c) — being in core cosubordination — can contain nai-de without
changing their adverbial nature, cf. (34a-c). On the other hand, if instead the
first core is negated by naku-te, the semantic relation changes and the nexus
type switches to coordination, cf. (34a-c). With naku-te, the utterance
asserts two separate events and there is no parallelism with NP-de.
(34)
LOCATIVE
a.zyoon
ga
noodosutoroomu
e
NOM
ALL
ika-nai-de kutu o
go-NEG-TE shoes ACC
katta
koto
bought fact
‘the fact that Joan bought shoes without going to Nordstrom’
a. zyoon
ga
noodosutoroomu
NOM
e
ALL
ika-naku-te kutu o
go-NEG-TE shoes ACC
katta
koto
bought fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t go to Nordstrom and bought shoes
(instead)’
MEANS
b. zyoon
ga
teepu
o
kika-nai-de
kankokugo o
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
tape
ACC
listen-NEG-TE Korean
benkyoo sita
koto
study
did
fact
‘the fact that Joan studied Korean without listening to tapes’
NOM
b. zyoon
169
ACC
ga
teepu o
kika-naku-te kankokugo o
tape
ACC
listen-NEG-TE Korean
ACC
benkyoo sita
koto
study
did
fact
‘the fact that Joan didn’t listen to tapes and studied Korean
(instead)’
NOM
MANNER
c.sakadati
si-nai-de
aruita
koto
(cf. 30b)
handstand do-NEG-TE walked fact
‘the fact that (I) didn’t walk standing on (my) hands’
c. sakadati
si-naku-te aruita
koto
handstand do-NEG-TE walked fact
‘the fact that (I) didn’t stand on (my) hands and (I) walked
(instead)’
Most NP-de’s, except MEASURE NPs, can readily be paraphrased with
TE-linkage. I therefore hypothesize that all but MEASURE NP-de’s are abbreviated forms of the corresponding TE-linked cores. In such TE-linkage,
when a particular NP in the first core and the predicate of the second core
jointly provide sufficient information about the semantic relation between the
linked cores, an equivalent sentence can be formulated in which the given NP
is marked with de and the TE-predicate does not appear at all: the NP-de now
metonymically stands for the original core. When the NP-de and the predicate
in the second core do not adequately specify the semantic relation, however,
this metonymy fails to convey the intended information. Such sentences as
(35) will not be uttered unless the speaker believes that the addressee can
readily identify what biza refers to and, consequently, that its adverbial
function is apparent to the addressee.
(35)
biza
de
katta.
bought
‘(I) bought (it) by (using) a VISA card.’
‘(I) bought (it) at (a store called) VISA.’
VISA PRT
There are some cases in which NP-de cannot stand metonymically for
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
the first core, e.g. (36).
(36)
amerika-zin no
sensee {#de / ni tuite} eego
o
American
GEN
teacher
PRT attend to English
ACC
benkyoo sitai.
(Endô 1982)
study
do-DES
Lit. ‘I want to study English attending to an American teacher.’
‘I want to study English with an American teacher.’
In (36), the semantic relation between the linked cores can be approximately
categorized as MEANS. However, the NP-de is inappropriate here, as if one
were to say ‘I studied English using an American teacher.’ The constraint is
purely pragmatic/sociolinguistic. Under certain circumstances, sentences
such as (36) may indeed be acceptable.
(36) amerika-zin de benkyoo suru to
arappoku
American
PRT study
do
CONJ crude
nattyau
no
yo
nee.
become put-NPST NMLZ PRT PRT
‘Studying with an American makes speech crude, as you know.’
4.
SUMMARY
A restricted number of predicates can take a TE-marked core as an argument.
With such predicates, the linkage type is, by definition, core subordination.
The semantic relation between the conjuncts in core subordination is determined solely by the semantics of the matrix predicate, just as with predicates
which take a clausal complement.
Core coordination is used when the linked cores are meant to denote
independent situations, while core cosubordination is used when the first core
functions as an adverbial modifier of the second. In both core subordination
and core coordination, the TE-marked core can be independently negated by
the core-level operator naku-te; in core cosubordination it cannot be. The
characteristics of these three nexus types are summarized as follows:
CORE SUBORDINATION TE-LINKAGE
Syntax:
Semantics:
Core Subordination
The TE-marked core is an argument of the matrix core.
CORE COORDINATION TE-LINKAGE
Chapter 5: TE-Linkage with Core Juncture
Syntax:
Semantics:
Core Coordination
The TE-linked cores denote separate propositions which
share the subject referent.
Pragmatics: The clause implicates a SEQUENCE, CAUSE, REASON,
or CONCESSIVE relation.
CORE COSUBORDINATION TE-LINKAGE
Syntax:
Core Cosubordination
Semantics: The TE-marked core functions as an adverbial modifier.
Pragmatics: The clause implicates a LOCATIVE, MEANS,
MATERIAL, MANNER, or MEASURE relation.
171
CHAPTER 6
TE-LINKAGE WITH CLAUSAL JUNCTURE
In this chapter we examine TE-linkage at the clause level. Section 1 discusses
the distinction between core-level and clause-level TE-linkage, and section 2
the fact that clause-level TE-linkage always involves cosubordination nexus.
Section 3 is concerned with the CAUSE relation, one of the most salient semantic relations typically expressed by TE-linkage. The topic of section 4 is
inferred intention, another potential motivation for employing TE-linkage.
Section 5 examines Kuno’s controllability constraints. Section 6 argues at an
abstract level that the function of TE-linkage is to give expression to the
speaker’s abductive interpretation of surrounding reality. Section 7 is devoted to a discussion of the adclausal nature of the first conjunct, a phenomenon which is generally observable in most multi-clausal sentences.
Section 8 concludes the chapter.
As in previous chapters, the term situation will be used to refer to
whatever the core or clause in question signifies. Situations are either static or
dynamic. Static situations will be referred to as states.1 Dynamic situations
are further divided into actions if the subject plays the role of agent, and
events otherwise.
1.
CLAUSAL VS. CORE JUNCTURE WITH NON-EMBEDDED
NEXUS
RRG posits a distinction between core and clausal juncture. With subordination nexus, the distinction is clear. Core subordination is lexically determined, i.e., the lexicon must supply information as to (i) which predicates
take an entire core as argument, and (ii) which particular connective (or
complementizer) must be utilized. If the second predicate does not take a
core as its argument, the juncture is at the clause level. In addition, clausal
subordination is usually signaled by a subordination conjunction, e.g. be1 Note that the same term state has been used earlier (Chapter 2) in the categorization
of verbals according to their inherent aspectual properties. As such lexical properties
will not be discussed in this chapter, no confusion should arise from this dual usage.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
173
cause, while, and before.
In this subsection I will examine the non-embedded (i.e.
non-subordinate) nexus types (coordination and cosubordination) in both
core and clausal juncture.
In Japanese, ellipsis — and in particular subject ellipsis — is very
common. Since the presence vs. absence of an overt subject is central to the
issue of clausal vs. core juncture, a brief digression is in order regarding the
treatment of ‘empty categories’ in RRG. RRG does not posit empty categories. Rather, it assumes that covert arguments are semantically supplied by
the interpreter from the linguistic or real-world context. Consider, for example, (1), with no overt subject.
(1) migoto
desu
ne.
splendid COP-NPST PRT
‘(That/It) is splendid, isn’t (it)?’
Because the interpreter knows that migoto desu ‘is/are splendid’ is predicative of some entity, s/he naturally seeks out the subject referent intended by
the speaker. Note that is splendid is not an acceptable sentence in English;
hence I have supplied that/it in the gloss of (1). The missing entity in Japanese, or whatever that/it refers to in English, may be deictically or anaphorically specified. When anaphoric, it may refer to the preceding
argumentation, speech act, or linguistic expression as well as an NP in a
previous utterance. As Gensler (1977) argues, such anaphora is in principle
non-syntactic, for the antecedent need not belong to the same syntactic category as the anaphoric pronoun or even be a syntactic category at all. He
points out:
We certainly cannot “syntax-ify” non-syntactic anaphora by analyzing
it/this/that as in some sense derivable (by deletion?) from something
like “this situation”, “what you said”, “things”, etc. Such an approach
not only embroils you in defending a particular word-choice (why
“situation” and not “state”?), but also passes the anaphoric buck from
it/this/that to a marginally “fuller” and more specified NP. In fact, such
phrases don’t even come near covering the huge semantic range of
non-syntactic anaphora. (324)
In RRG, the semantic valency of a predicate must be fully stated in its
logical structure; but covert arguments are not considered to be present in the
syntactic structure. If a construction involves a control phenomenon, e.g.
EQUI or Raising, RRG analyzes it in such a way that the overt argument is
shared by both predicates (i.e. pivot, see Chapter 5 §2), rather than positing an
empty category which is coreferential with the overt NP. With regard to the
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
non-embedded nexus types, if there is argument sharing, the linkage is stipulated as core juncture; if not, as clausal juncture.
The basic diagnostic test for the core-clause distinction is thus whether
or not each linked clause has its own syntactic subject. At a first level of
approximation, this applies straightforwardly to TE-linkage in Japanese.
When both subjects are present, e.g. (2), the linkage is unproblematically
determined to be at the clause level.2
(2) a.zyoon
ga
gitaa o
hiite
zyoon
guitar ACC play-TE
‘Joan will play the guitar, and Joan will sing.’
ga
NOM
b. zyoon
gitaa o
hiite
hiro
guitar ACC play-TE
‘Joan will play the guitar, and Hiro will sing.’
NOM
ga
ga
NOM
NOM
utau.
sing-NPST
utau.
sing-NPST
However, because Japanese permits fairly unrestricted ellipsis, either or both
clauses may lack overt subject NPs. In such cases, the determination of
clausal vs. core juncture depends heavily upon the possibilities of coreferential or noncoreferential interpretation of the two subjects. In principle,
nothing forces such elliptical sentences to be construed as having coreferential subjects; thus although there is no overt subject in either clause in (3), the
semantics of the linked clauses forces the interpreter to construe the subjects
as having disjoint reference. (Note that the two clauses in (3) are not
TE-linked.)
(3) setumee
suru to
nattoku
simasita.
explanation do
CONJ compliance do(POL)
‘(I) explained, and (s/he) understood (it).’
With TE-linkage, however, such disjoint-reference construal is ordinarily prohibited when one (or both) of the subjects is missing; the subjects
must be interpreted as coreferential. For example, while (4a), having two
overt subjects, is grammatical, (4b-d) are not.3
(4) a.zyoon
ga
NOM
setumee
site
hiro
explanation do-TE
wa
TOP
nattoku
compliance
2 Unlike English, it is more natural in Japanese to repeat the NP in the second clause,
as shown in (2a), than to use an anaphoric pronoun.
3 Sentence (4b) can be acceptable if the covert subject of the second clause is con-
strued as coreferential with the discourse topic.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
175
simasita.
did(POL)
‘Joan explained, and Hiro understood (it).’
b. #zyoon
ga
setumee
site
nattoku
simasita.
explanation do-TE compliance did(POL)
‘Joan explained, and (he) understood (it).’
[intended]
NOM
c.#setumee
site
hiro wa
nattoku
simasita.
explanation do-TE
TOP
compliance did(POL)
‘(She) explained, and Hiro understood (it).’
[intended]
d. #setumee
site
nattoku
simasita.
explanation do-TE compliance did(POL)
‘(She) explained, and (he) understood (it).’
[intended]
With TE-linkage, it is generally the case that if both subjects are present the
juncture is at the clause level and disjoint reference is permitted; if either or
both of the subjects is missing, the juncture is at the core level and disjoint
reference is prohibited. Presence of both subjects vs. absence of either of
them is thus the most salient indicator of clausal vs. core juncture.
There is one salient exception to this generalization. If the subject is a
human being, Japanese provides several morpholexical means for delimiting
potential subject referents, thereby allowing or indeed requiring noncoreferential interpretation even when no overt subject is present. For example, as
shown in (5a), if an honorific form of the verbal is used in the second clause,
the subject cannot be the speaker or his/her ‘insider’, whereas if a
psych-predicate is used, (5b), the subject must be the speaker. 4 In (5) a
switch in subject reference is thus explicitly signaled by the choice of predicate. Such sentences can accordingly be taken as representing clause-level
juncture even in the absence of an overt second subject.
(5) a.zyoon
ga
NOM
go-setumee
site
nattoku
explanation(HON) do-TE compliance
TABLE 1: Core vs. Clausal Juncture
1st Subject
Present
Absent
Absent
2nd Subject
Absent
Present
Absent
Coreferential
Noncoreferential
CORE
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE (*)
CLAUSE (*)
CLAUSE (*)
4 For the notion ‘insider’, see Chapter 4 §6.3.1; for psych-predicates, see Chapter 1
§3.3.3.
176
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
Present
Present
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
nasaimasita.
did(POL, HON)
‘Joan explained, and (he) understood (it).’
b. zyoon ga
nattoku
site
hotto simasita.
NOM compliance did-TE be.relieved(POL, Psych-Pred)
‘Joan understood (it), and (I) was relieved.’
This holds, however, only for these ‘special’ predicate types. With ‘ordinary’
predicates, a covert subject must be coreferential with the overt subject or the
other covert subject, and thus the linkage is at the core level. These facts are
summarized in Table 1. The asterisks in parentheses indicate that the combination is ungrammatical with ‘ordinary’ predicates.
2.
NEXUS TYPES
When we consider what nexus types exist in clause-level TE-linkage, we
reach a surprising conclusion: only cosubordination is possible. The crucial
factor motivating this judgment is the question of when and whether there is
or is not operator dependency at the clause level. If there is, the nexus type is
uniquely determined to be cosubordination; if not, the nexus is either subordination or coordination.
As remarked in Chapter 2 §3, there are four kinds of clause-level operators — status (epistemic modals, external negation), tense, evidentials, and
illocutionary force (declarative, interrogative, imperative). With regard to
tense, at least, we have seen (Chapter 1 §2.3.4) that clause-level juncture need
not require operator dependency; this is illustrated in (6). Even though the
first clause is grammatically tenseless, it does not take its semantic tense from
the second clause.
(6) maki wa
TOP
kinoo
yesterday
oosaka e
ALL
itte hiro wa
go-TE
TOP
asita oosaka kara kaette
kuru.
tomorrow
ABL
return-TE come
‘Maki went to Osaka yesterday, and Hiro will return from Osaka
tomorrow.’
It is important to stress, however, that the above criterion for cosubor-
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
177
dination (viz. operator dependency) does not stipulate dependency with
respect to all relevant operators. If there is dependency regarding even a
single operator at the given juncture level, the nexus is determined to be
cosubordination. Here we will use the imperative operator nasai as a diagnostic for clause-level operator dependency. It turns out that with TE-linkage,
both clauses must be inside the scope of nasai. In (7a), for example, both
finishing the work and going home are understood to be orders. The anomaly
of (7b,c) is due to the fact that although the first clause is part of a command,
it does not denote an action controllable by the addressee and cannot be
construed as having a second-person subject.
(7) a.hayaku sigoto o
sumasete uti
ni
kaeri- nasai.
quickly work
ACC
finish-TE home LOC return IMP
‘Finish (your) work quickly, and go home!’
b. #zyoon
ga
ni
NOM
kite
uti
came-TE home
‘Because Joan came, go home!’
LOC
kaeri- nasai.
return IMP
[intended]
c.#atukute
mado
o
ake- nasai.
(Morita 1980)
be.hot-TE window ACC open IMP
‘Because (it)’s hot, open the window!’
[intended]
The results of this diagnostic test with nasai indicate clearly that clause-level
TE-linkage can only involve cosubordination. Figure 1 below presents the
RRG structure of clause-level cosubordination TE-linkage.
3.
CAUSE RELATION
3.1.
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
It has frequently been claimed in the literature that one of the major functions
of TE-linkage is to express TEMPORAL SEQUENCE or CONSECUTIVENESS
(Matsuo 1936, NLRI 1951, Negishi 1970, Kuno 1973, T. Takahashi 1975, Morita
1980, Endô 1982, Konoshima 1983, Narita 1983, R. Hamada 1985, Matsuda
1985). In this section, it is argued to the contrary that TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
per se cannot be expressed by TE-linkage.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
SENTENCE
CLAUSE
PCS
ADV
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CORE
CORE
ARG
NUC
NP
PRED
ARG NUC
NP PRED
hayaku sigoto o sumasete
uti ni kaeri- nasai
NUC
NUC
CORE
CORE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
CLAUSE
IF
‘Finish (your) work quickly, and go home!’ (=7a)
FIGURE 1: Clausal Cosubordination
As discussed in Chapter 1, given appropriate pairs of clauses, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE can always be implicated when two clauses are in parataxis, e.g. (8).
(8) a.maki ga
tatiagatta. mado
ga
aita.
stood.up
window NOM opened
‘Maki stood up. The window opened.’
NOM
b. kodomo ga
kaizyoo
ni
tuita.
kooen ga
child
NOM meeting.place LOC
arrived lecture NOM
hazimatta.
began
‘A child arrived at the meeting place. The lecture began.’
However, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE cannot be implicated when the same
clauses are linked by TE, as illustrated in (9).5
5 Sentences like (9) can express a TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation, but only if such
adverbials as sugu ni ‘soon’ and 5-hun-go ni ‘5 minutes later’ are inserted between
the clauses. The point is that TE-linkage by itself is not sufficient to implicate
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
(9) a.#maki
179
ga
tatiagatte
mado
ga
aita.
stand.up-TE window NOM opened
‘Maki stood up, and the window opened.’
NOM
b. #kodomo ga
kaizyoo
ni
tuite
kooen ga
child
NOM meeting.place LOC
arrive-TE lecture NOM
hazimatta.
began
‘A child arrived at the meeting place, and the lecture began.’
Significantly, there would be no unnaturalness here if the connective to (with
a necessary alteration to the inflection of the preceding predicate) were used
instead of TE, as shown in (10).
(10) a.maki ga
tatiagaru to
mado
ga
aita.
stand-up CONJ window NOM opened
‘Maki stood up, and the window opened.’
NOM
b. kodomo ga
kaizyoo
ni
tuku
to
kooen
child
NOM meeting.place LOC
arrive CONJ lecture
ga
hazimatta.
NOM began
‘A child arrived at the meeting place, and the lecture began.’
The sentences in (10) do permit TEMPORAL SEQUENCE interpretations.
There is thus nothing inherently anomalous about conjoining the two clauses
in each pair in (9) — i.e., the anomaly is not purely pragmatic, as it would be
in Joan ate sushi, and the tower collapsed.
Observe that a small alteration in (9a-b) enhances the acceptability
(9a-b).
(9) a.Maki ga
NOM
oogoe
o
loud.voice ACC
dasite
emit-TE
mado
window
ga
NOM
aita.
opened
‘Maki screamed, and the window opened.’
b. koosi
lecturer
hazimatta.
ga
NOM
kaizyoo
ni
meeting.place LOC
tuite
arrive-TE
kooen ga
lecture NOM
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
began
‘The lecturer arrived at the meeting place, and the lecture began.’
Changing tatiagar- ‘stand up’ in (9a) to oogoe o das- ‘scream’ in (9a) improves the naturalness somewhat because an extremely loud sound can, in
principle, cause windows to open. In (9b), replacement of the subject kodomo
‘child’ with koosi ‘lecturer’ makes the sentence perfectly natural because it is
precisely the arrival of the lecturer that enables the lecture to begin. The key
in both cases is the notion of causation. If native speakers of Japanese are
forced to interpret (9), they read in some sort of CAUSE relation, above and
beyond mere TEMPORAL SEQUENCE — e.g., Maki has the magical power to
open windows by standing up.
If TE-linkage were in fact able to express a TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
relation, then all naturally occurring event sequences should be compatible
with TE-linkage. However, as shown above, this is not the case. From the
anomalies observed in such sentences as (9), I therefore conclude that mere
incidental sequence of events — i.e. pure TEMPORAL SEQUENCE proper —
cannot be expressed by the use of TE-linkage. The question, then, becomes:
What makes a sequence of situations nonincidental?. As suggested above,
the notion of causation is one factor that plays a central role.
It has been claimed that TE links two constituents more ‘tightly’ than
does to (Kuno 1973, Matsuda 1985). Of course, many interpretations could
be given to the word tightly, and the authors just cited in fact have several
senses in mind. But if we choose to interpret it as the involvement of some
notion of causation, this characterization provides a partial account of the
inappropriateness of TE in the sentences in (9), in which the pairs of clauses
fail to show any obvious CAUSE relations. The next two subsections will
discuss what is generally meant by the term causation, and how these considerations contribute to our understanding of TE-linkage.
3.2.
Causation
According to Taylor (1967), who summarizes the philosophical controversies
over causation, the notions of power and necessity were central in the debates
over causation prior to David Hume’s An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Some thinkers considered a cause to be that which has the
power to produce the change in question — and first and foremost the divine
power of God.6 Others assumed there was a certain necessary connection
6 In his Essays on the Active Powers of the Human Mind, Thomas Reid claims that
the causation of voluntary action by an agent is the paradigm example of causation,
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
181
between any cause and its effect. Hume took a different approach. Although
he did not deny that humans have the idea of a necessary connection between
cause and effect, he claimed that such a connection is found only in human
habits of expectation, not between causes themselves and their effects. In
other words, causal relations exist only in human cognition.
One universally accepted characteristic of causation is that causes
cannot occur after their effects. Based on this conception, Hume defined
causal relations as invariable sequences. Two spatially contiguous changes
or sets of changes, A and B, are in a causal relation if A is immediately followed by B and if situations similar to A are always immediately followed by
situations similar to B. The notion of similarity is crucial here because
without it the human conception of a causal link between specific situations
cannot be accounted for. Suppose, for example, that Smith was beheaded and
died. This sequence of situations occurred and can occur only once in history,
and yet we recognize a causal relation because we ‘know’ that anyone who is
beheaded invariably dies. As Russell (1917) cautions, however, similarity is
itself a difficult concept to define.
Many recent researchers consider there to be some sense of necessity in
causation: a cause is said to be the (set of) necessary condition(s) for the
situation in question to occur. In other words, ‘A is the cause of B’ indicates
that had A not occurred, B would not have occurred either (Dowty 1972,
Lewis 1973, Mackie 1974).7 A necessary condition is one in the absence of
which the event cannot take place: a sufficient condition is one in the presence
of which the event is certain to take place. In propositional logic, a sufficient
condition is expressed as an apodosis, and a necessary condition as a protasis:
in P  Q, P is a sufficient condition for Q, and Q is a necessary condition for
P.
The definition of causation in terms of counterfactual conditionals
emphasizes the importance of considering what would have happened under
some hypothetical situation different from the actual one. Let P1 and P2
represent two propositions. For Dowty, ‘P1 causes P2’ is formalized as P2 &
(–P2  –P1), where P  Q symbolizes the relationship such that in the
closest worlds in which P is true, Q is also true. For example, ‘Because the
gardener didn’t water them (P1), the roses died (P2)’ is paraphrased as ‘The
and that the relations between successive states of inanimate things can be called
causal only in a metaphorical sense (Taylor 1967). This ‘generative’ view of causation has recently gained increasing support, e.g. Harré and Madden (1975), Shultz
(1982), Langacker (1990).
7 This analysis was suggested by John Stuart Mill in his System of Logic (Mackie
1974).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
roses died, and in the closest worlds in which they did not die, the gardener
watered them’.8
Such an analysis amounts to a reduction of causation to conditional
logic. But this cannot account for the fundamentally asymmetrical relation
between cause and effect. If P is a sufficient condition for Q, then Q is by
definition a necessary condition for P — which leads to many conceptual
anomalies. In interpreting ‘Because Smith was beheaded, he died,’ we are
reluctant to conclude that because the beheading of Smith has been established as a sufficient condition for his death, his death was a necessary condition for his being beheaded.
Another problem with the conditional analysis is that it also applies to
cases which are considered to involve no CAUSE relation at all (on this, see
Abbott 1974). For example, in (11), it is true that Joan stole the vase (P2) and
in the closest worlds in which Joan didn’t steal it (–P2), Joan didn’t come to
the speaker’s house (–P1). And yet, we are reluctant to admit that these two
situations are related causally.
(11)
Joan came to my house (P1) and stole the vase (P2).
On the other hand, Dowty’s analysis does conform to our understanding of
(12): Joan broke her leg, and she wouldn’t have broken her leg only if she
hadn’t fallen (= if she had fallen she would have broken her leg), P2 & (–P2
 –P1).
(12)
Joan fell (P1) and broke her leg (P2).
As we have seen, although there is little dispute that the idea of causation is indispensable in understanding the human cognitive faculty, there is
no universally accepted sense of ‘causation’. Part of the problem is, as Hume
argues, that causation does not exist as part of objective reality. Rather,
causation exists in relation to our interpretation of reality. Thus attempts to
represent causation independently of the interpreter, e.g. in terms of formal
logic, inevitably fail to capture the full meaning of causation. The most
general idea of a cause seems to be something or some situation which pro8 One might feel that it would be more accurate to paraphrase the sentence as ‘The
roses died, and in the closest worlds in which the gardener watered them, they didn’t
die’, i.e. P2 & (–P1  P2). However, it would also be true that if someone other
than the gardener had watered the roses, they also wouldn’t have died. The intended
meaning here is ‘The roses wouldn’t have died only if the gardener had watered
them’. (Recall that ‘P only if Q’ is symbolized as –Q  –P.) Therefore, Dowty’s
representation is closer to this causal relationship. See McCawley (1976) for further
discussion.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
183
duces, and thus is felt to account for, some change. Hart and Honoré contend:
‘There is not a single concept of causation but a group or family of concepts.
These are united not by a set of common features but by points of resemblance, some of them tenuous’ (1959:26). The notion resemblance is again
cognitive and cannot be represented without recourse to an interpreter of
reality.
Humans do not perceive the physical world as a constantly changing
stream of disconnected and arbitrary happenings but rather as situations
occurring in organized patterns over specific spans of time (Minsky 1975,
Schank and Abelson 1977, Bullock et al. 1982, Shultz 1982). Bullock et al.
(1982:209) claim that the fundamental basis on which humans assign
boundaries to discrete situations is constituted by our tendency to perceive or
infer cause-effect relations. In the act of cutting bread, for example, we
regard the parting of the bread as being caused by the knife’s action, rather
than viewing the scene as involving two simultaneous but disconnected sequences of knife movements and bread movements. As Bullock et al. note
(210):
First, by imposing a causal connection, we efficiently collapse a series
of temporally successive motions into a single event. Second, by this
bracketing into causal events, we not only separate meaningful, coherent
patterns from all that goes on around us, but also impart structure to the
world. When we attribute the parting of the bread to the knife’s action,
we relate actions to results, transformations to outcomes, and thus
construct our own physical reality.
Bullock et al. posit three principles underlying causal attribution by
language users: (i) determinism, (ii) priority, and (iii) mechanism. First,
people are reluctant or unwilling to allow causeless occurrences. Even if they
cannot identify the cause, they are likely to believe that it exists. Second,
causes necessarily precede or are coincidental with their effects. Events that
follow the ‘effect’ are not considered to be candidate ‘causes’. As for
mechanism, speakers assume that causes bring about their effects by transferring causal impetus, directly or through a chain of intermediary events. It
is by attempting to make causal attributions that humans learn how the objects
in their environment characteristically work, and they use such knowledge to
predict, influence, and explain actions.
In analyzing TE-constructions in Japanese, we need to keep in mind that
the semantic relation CAUSE is a fundamentally interpretive one: it signifies
the speaker’s interpretation of a succession of events and, in turn, the hearer’s
confirmation of such an interpretation.
We turn now to a detailed analysis of the kind of TE-linkage which
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
expresses a CAUSE relation. One important generalization is that a causal
interpretation is not possible when TE-linkage joins two actions that are
performed by the same individual.9 Causal interpretations are possible (inter
alia) between two events, two states, an event and a state, or a state and an
event, as illustrated by examples (13)-(16). (All the a-sentences in (13)-(20)
involve clausal juncture, and the b-sentences core juncture.)
(13)
Event + Event
a.kome ga
ketteeteki-na dageki o
ukete kiki ga
rice NOM fatal
blow
ACC
get-TE crisis NOM
semaru.
[Ame]
approach
‘Because rice production will suffer a fatal blow, a crisis will
approach.’
b. kome ga ketteeteki-na dageki o ukete zenmetu
suru.
get-TE annihilation do
‘Because rice production will suffer a fatal blow, (it) will be totally
destroyed.’
(14)
State + State
a.kyoo wa
atukute
totemo hasirenai.
today TOP be.hot-TE very
cannot.run
‘Because it’s hot today, (I) can’t possibly run.’
(Matsuda 1985)
b. kono kuruma wa
takakute
urenai.
this car
TOP
be.expensive-TE sell-POT-NEG-NPST
‘Because this car is expensive, (it) cannot sell.’
(15) Event + State
a.zyoon ga
siken ni
ukatte
watasi wa
totemo
NOM examDAT
pass-TE I
TOP
very
uresii.
be.happy-NPST
‘Because Joan passed the exam, I’m very happy.’
b. zyoon wa
okane o
nusumarete komatte
TOP
money ACC steal-PASS-TE be.in.trouble-TE
9 This is certainly true for TE-linkage, and very likely for causation in general.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
185
iru.
be-NPST
‘Because Joan had money stolen, (she) is in trouble.’
(16) State + Event
a.keeki
ga
warukute situgyooritu
ga
economic.situation NOM be.bad-TE unemployment.rate NOM
agatta.
increased
‘Because the economic situation was bad, the unemployment rate
increased.’
b. kono kuruma wa
yasukute
yoku ureta.
this car
TOP
be.inexpensive-TE well sold
‘Because this car was inexpensive, (it) sold well.’
When one of the TE-linked constituents refers to an action, a CAUSE
interpretation can emerge if the other constituent refers to a state or event.
(17) State + Action10
a.kyuuryoo ga
yasukute
tensyoku
sita.
salary
NOM be.cheap-TE
changing.a.job did
‘Because (my) salary was low, (I) changed jobs.’
b. kanasikute yake-zake
o
nonda.
be.sad-TE
desperate.drink ACC drank
‘Because (I) was sad, (I) drank out of desperation.’
(18)
Action + State
a.kuruma o
katte
okane ga
nai.
car
ACC
buy-TE money NOM be-NEG-NPST
Lit. ‘Because (I) bought a car, there is not any money.’
‘Because (I) bought a car, (I) don’t have any money.’
b. konna
mono o
katte
kookai site
iru.
this.kind thing ACC buy-TE regret do-TE be-NPST
‘Because (I) bought this kind of junk, (I) regret (it).’
10 All the a-sentences in (17, 18, 19) permit disjoint reference for the covert subject
even though the predicates do not belong to the special categories discussed at the end
of Section 1 above. Such construal seems to be permitted if the referent of the missing
subject is understood to be in a ‘possessor’ relation (loosely conceived) to the overt
subject, i.e. my salary, money, friend.
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(19)
Event + Action
a.tomodati ga
ziko
ni
atte
byooin
ni
friend
NOM accident DAT
meet-TE hospital LOC
turete
itta.
take-TE went
‘Because a friend of mine had an accident, (I) took (him/her) to the
hospital.’
b. dikku wa
suuzan ni
susumerarete syutuzyoo
sita.
be.advised-TE entering.an.event did
Lit. ‘Because Dick was advised by Susan, (he) entered the event.’
‘Dick entered the event on Susan’s advice.’
(NLRI 1951)
TOP
(20)
DAT
Action + Event
a.zyoon
ga
kuruma o
katte minna
yorokonda.
car
ACC
buy-TE everyone got.delighted
‘Because Joan bought a car, everyone got delighted.’
NOM
b. tomodati o
izimete
sensee ni
sikarareta.
friend
ACC
pester-TE teacher DAT scold-PASS-PST
‘Because (I) pestered my friend, (I) was scolded by the teacher.’
(Endô 1982)
Even when both conjuncts denote actions, a CAUSE interpretation is
possible if the subjects are overt and distinct.
(21) Action + Action (Different Subjects)
a.zyoon ga
kite
biru ga
kaetta.
NOM come-TE
NOM went.home
‘Because Joan came, Bill went home.’
TABLE 2: CAUSE Interpretation with TE-Linkage
C1
C2
Is a CAUSE interpretation possible?
State
State
State
Event
Event
Event
State
Event
Action
State
Event
Action
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
Action
Action
Action
b. zyoon
State
Event
Action
ga
NOM
kuruma
car
187
Yes
Yes
Yes, but only if SUBJ1  SUBJ2
o
ACC
katte biru ga
buy-TE
NOM
okane o
money ACC
haratta.
paid
‘Because Joan bought a car, Bill paid (for it).’
Only when both subjects are the same and both conjuncts denote actions is a
causal interpretation excluded.
Table 2 above summarizes the possible CAUSE interpretations with
TE-linkage. C1 and C2 symbolize the semantic content of the first and the
second conjunct, and SUBJ1 and SUBJ2 the referents of the subjects in C1
and C2.
The formula in (22) represents these potential interpretations procedurally.
(22)
TE-Linkage Interpretation Principle (Provisional)
if {–ACTION (C1)  – ACTION (C2)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then CAUSE (C1, C2)
3.3.
Causes and Reasons
When C2 is an action, we perceive some CAUSE relation if C1 is an event or
an action with a distinct agent. However, this type of CAUSE relation is
significantly different from those observed between other combinations of
events, states, and actions. We are inclined to consider C1 a REASON, rather
than a CAUSE in its ordinary sense.
Prototypically, causation applies to the world of physical entities and
natural laws, whereas reasons concern human beings and their intentions. On
the other hand, it has often been argued that reasons are themselves causal in
nature (cf. e.g. Davidson 1980). Ordinary language sometimes employs a
word corresponding to cause, and frequently a word corresponding to because, even where reasons and not causes are involved. Further, there are
clear regularities obtaining between reasons and actions, regularities similar
to those that lie at the heart of the CAUSE relation in the Humean conception
of causation. Donnellan (1967:86), however, argues that while appeal to such
facts ‘may shift the burden of proof to the other side, it does little to establish
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
that reason explanations are straightforward causal explanation. The word
“because” may have a different use in these circumstances, or it might only be
a way of emphasizing, somewhat metaphorically, the “compelling” nature of
the reason.’ He also argues that ‘while regularity is the core of the causal
relation for Hume, it must be a regularity of a certain kind: an empirical
regularity. Whether the connection between reasons and actions is merely
empirical has been strongly questioned’ (ibid.).
Donnellan points out the following differences between reasons and
causes. First, an agent seems to have a privileged and self-sufficient position
concerning the reasons (though not the causes) underlying his/her own actions. In the normal case, the agent need not appeal to evidence and empirical
investigation to establish what the reasons are. Second, humans seem willing
to accept a reason explanation without demanding any generalization (to a
larger class of analogous cases) of the relationship between the particular
action and the particular reason. These two characteristics are foreign to
causal explanation. Third, while causal explanation depends on the empirical
and contingent nature of the causal connection, there is a more than contingent relation between reasons and actions. The reason an action is performed
is because the actor desires the outcome of the action. To give a reason is to
indicate, explicitly or implicitly, such wanting. However, wanting is nothing
but a tendency to act;11 to want to do something is to be prepared under
certain circumstances to take the necessary steps.12 If wanting is conceived
as a tendency to action, then by that very token there is a logical (analytic)
connection between wanting and action; thus it would be odd to count
wanting as a cause of action and hence to construe its relation to the action as
merely contingent.
Hart and Honoré (1959:39), who have investigated causation in judicial
contexts, note that ‘a voluntary human action intended to bring about what in
fact happens, and in the manner in which it happens, has a special place in
causal inquiries ... When the question is how far back a cause shall be traced
through a number of intervening causes, such a voluntary action very often is
regarded both as a limit and also as still the cause even though other later
11 It is important here to distinguish between wanting (e.g. ‘I want to give you $5’)
and wishing (e.g. ‘I want you to give me $5’).
12 One might argue that there are some actions that a person may want to perform but
would under no circumstances actually do, e.g. killing someone. However, if this is a
genuine desire and not an idle wish, it should be supposed that the action is to some
degree tempting to the person. In such a case, Donnellan argues, we will have to
include a weakening of one’s moral inhibitions as part of the set of circumstances
under which one would be prepared to do the act.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
189
abnormal occurrences are recognized as causes.’ For example:
If unusual quantities of arsenic are found in a dead man’s body, this is up
to a point an explanation of his death and so the cause of it; but we
usually press for a further and more satisfying explanation and may find
that someone deliberately put arsenic in the victim’s food. This is a
fuller explanation in terms of human agency; and ... we speak of the
poisoner’s action as the cause of the death; though we do not withdraw
the title of cause from the presence of arsenic in the body — this is now
thought of as the “mere way” in which the poisoner produced the effect.
Once we have reached this point ... we have something which has a
special finality at the level of common sense: for though we may look for
and find an explanation of why the poisoner did what he did in terms of
motives like greed or revenge, we do not regard his motive ... as the
cause of the death ... We do not trace the cause through the deliberate
act. (39-40)
Like Donnellan, Buss (1978) also argues against the reason-as-cause
analysis. He claims that although both causes and reasons are necessary for
an adequate explanation of human action, they are logically distinct categories that explain different aspects of behavior: a cause is that which brings
about a change, whereas a reason is that which a change is brought about for.
Reason explanations of actions are given in light of causal explanations of
what has happened to the individual, i.e. when talking about some non-action
that an individual has ‘suffered’ (Buss, following Skinner 1972).
From a linguistic point of view, it is apparent that when we describe or
explain a situation involving a person, we make a distinction between those
situations in which the person acts intentionally (i.e. the person is an agent)
and those in which s/he has no control over (or ‘suffers’, to use Skinner’s
term) what happens. Language provides a rich vocabulary for distinguishing
agentive and nonagentive roles of participants in the described situation (cf.
Fillmore 1968; Lyons 1968, 1977; Talmy 1976).
When we perceive a person as an agent, we expect his/her behavior to be
a succession of rational, purposeful actions. For example, if someone with
whom I am walking suddenly stops, I will automatically think that there is a
reason for her action. If I find that she is looking at something, I will understand that she stopped because she wanted to see that object. If the reason
is not obvious, I will ask her what was going on in her mind (asking for a
reason explanation). If she does not explain and says ‘Nothing,’ then I will
think the reason was trivial and ignore it. However, if she keeps on stopping,
I will then start to worry and will ask her if she is sick (asking for a causal
explanation). If she still does not explain, I will think that she is bizarre and
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
that my rational expectations do not work in her case.
These considerations are relevant to the semantics and pragmatics of
TE-linkage. TE-linkage is used to express a nonincidental sequence of situations; and such sequences include (i) those in which humans normally perceive the first situation as a CAUSE of the second, (ii) those in which both
situations involve an action performed by the same individual, and (iii) those
in which the first situation is to be regarded as the REASON for the second.
These categories reflect human strategies for bracketing surrounding situations. The principle provisionally stated in (22) must thus be revised as (23).
Note that unlike a CAUSE relation, which uniquely signifies the speaker’s
interpretation of the two situations, a REASON relation involves two individuals, viz. the agent and the speaker, who interprets and explains the action.
Thus REASON should be a three-place predicate: ‘REASON (SUBJ2, C1,
C2)’ symbolizes the relationship that C1 is SUBJ2’s reason for C2.
(23)
TE-Linkage Interpretation Principle (Revision 1)
if
{–ACTION (C1)  –ACTION (C2)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then CAUSE (C1, C2)
else if ACTION (C2)
if {–ACTION (C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON (SUBJ2, C1, C2)
which is equivalent to:
if ACTION (C2)
if {–ACTION (C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON ( SUBJ2, C1, C2)
else CAUSE (C1, C2)
4.
INFERRED INTENTION
What is excluded from Principle (23) are those cases in which both C1 and
C2 are actions performed by the same agent,13 e.g. (24).
(24) a.ohuro ni
haitte
syukudai o
sita.
bath
LOC
enter-TE homework ACC did
‘(I) took a bath and did my homework.’
b. zyoon
wa
TOP
asa-gohan
breakfast
o
ACC
tabete gakkoo ni
eat-TE school LOC
13 The linkage type discussed in this section is thus at the core level.
itta.
went
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
191
‘Joan ate breakfast and went to school.’
As Bullock et al. (1982) claim, humans ‘bracket’ sequences of discrete situations in certain ways. The fundamental use of TE-linkage is to express such
bracketed situations — which reflect our innate perception of physical and
psychological reality. In the previous subsections, two independent principles for such bracketing were discussed, viz. causation and reason. In this
section, I introduce another principle, viz. intention of the same individual. In
(24), we do not perceive any causation, nor do we consider C1 a reason for
C2. However, we do not consider that C1 and C2 are incidentally aligned in
time, either. These situations are nonincidental because they have both been
brought about through the intention of some single individual.
Normally we are inclined to infer other people’s intentions because we
have intuitive ideas about our own actions and under normal circumstances
we interpret the other’s actions as directed toward achieving various goals or
bringing about various states of affairs. In other words, we interpret the
other’s actions by analogical reasoning from our own actions. This is possible because humans have an innate awareness of the similarities between
themselves and others (Miller and Johnson-Laird 1976:101-2). Human infants display a special interest in the human face and the human voice. In fact,
every species has some mechanism for recognizing its own members, for
obvious biological reasons.
Intentions are conduct controllers (Bratman 1987:7), and in concert
with belief they move us to act. Human intentional actions, both the speaker’s
and everyone else’s, are (and are understood as) plan-based and
goal-oriented. Human beings typically plan to perform their actions in a
certain sequence, as in (24) above, and intentions play a motivational role in
such planning. A particularly salient example of goal-orientedness is actions
which involve a MEANS-END relation, e.g. (25).
(25) a.haha
ni
denwa-site
okane o
karita.
mother LOC telephone-TE money ACC borrowed
‘(I) called (my) mother and borrowed (some) money.’
b. renga o
katte ie
o
brick ACC buy-TE house ACC
‘(I) bought bricks and built a house.’
tateta.
built
With these sentences, the intention behind performing C1 is to achieve C2.
Here, the motivation for the use of TE-linkage is the agent’s intention inferred
by the speaker, not TEMPORAL SEQUENCE per se.
Principle (23) is revised accordingly as (26).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
(26)
TE-Linkage Interpretation Principle (Revision 2)
if
ACTION (C2)
if {–ACTION(C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON (SUBJ2, C1, C2)
else INTEND (SUBJ1, (C1 & C2))
else CAUSE (C1, C2)
Here the first else-condition, which applies to the case where both C1 and C2
are actions performed by the same individual (SUBJ1=SUBJ2), states that
the interpretation should be that C1 and C2 are intended by SUBJ1. If the
relevant interpretive relation (REASON, INTEND, CAUSE) is inconsistent
with the interpreter’s belief world, the sentence will be judged unnatural. The
next section illustrates how Principle (26) applies to various cases discussed
by Kuno (1973).
5.
KUNO’S CONTROLLABILITY CONSTRAINT
Kuno (1973:196-97) observes that in TE-linkage with identical subjects (i.e.
non-embedded core juncture), both cores must be either self-controllable (i.e.
agentive, or actions) or both non-self-controllable (i.e. nonagentive, or
events). In his view, violation of this constraint leads to anomalous sentences.
Kuno judges the following examples ungrammatical because of the violation
of the constraint: in (27), the first predicate is non-controllable, the second
controllable.14
(27) a.zyon wa
asa
me o samasite kao o
aratta.
morning wake-TE
face ACC washed
‘John woke up in the morning and washed his face.’
TOP
b. zyon wa
hikoozyoo ni
tuite
ie
airport
LOC
arrive-TE home
denwa
sita.
telephone did
‘John arrived at the airport and called home.’
TOP
ni
LOC
14 It should be noted that the awkwardness of (27a) is not due solely to the lack of
agreement in controllability. In the event sequence implicit in (27a), an intermediate
action — ‘getting up’ — is missing; if the second core in (27a) were to be replaced by,
say, ‘looked around’, the sentence would be perfectly natural, even though the second
predicate refers to a controllable action. In (27b), ‘arrive’ (tuk-) is a non-controllable
verb in Japanese.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
c.zyon wa
marii ni
TOP
193
guuzen
deatte
sono hanasi
accidentally meet-TE that talk
LOC
o
sita.
did
‘John ran into Mary accidentally and talked about it (i.e. some
matter or other).’
ACC
While some may consider these sentences awkward, it is overly pedantic to
claim that they are actually ungrammatical. The following are some attested
examples which violate Kuno’s controllability constraint. In (28a), where the
constituent in question is highlighted in bold face, the first core is
self-controllable, whereas the second core is non-self-controllable. In (28b),
the first core is non-self-controllable, and the second self-controllable.
(28) a.ware-ware wa
katute
amano
we
TOP
previously
kootyoo ga
ninen-see
no
principal NOM 2-year-system GEN
ikkoo
(high-school)
zenki
daigaku-an
1st-half college.plan
o
teesyoo site
yabureta koto o
omoidasu.
propose do-TE lost
fact ACC recall
‘We recall that Amano, a high-school principal, proposed a twoyear college system some time ago, but lost (an election).’
(NLRI 1951)
ACC
b. Yui wa
... sono onna
no
ane
geesya to
that woman GEN sister geisha COM
sitasiku
natte
kekkon
sita.
(NLRI 1951)
be.friendly become-TE marriage did
‘Yui became friends with a sister geisha of that woman and
married (her).’
TOP
On the other hand, it is true that when there is agreement in controllability, the sentence sounds more natural, as shown in (29). Aw- in (29c) is
polysemous; it can mean either to meet someone intentionally (controllable)
or to run into someone (non-controllable). The former interpretation is naturally selected with (29c) because of the controllability of the second core —
a reflection of the preference for agreement in controllability.
(29) a.zyon wa
asa
okite
kao o
aratta.
morning get.up-TE face ACC washed
TOP
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘John got up in the morning and washed his face.’
b. zyon wa
hikoozyoo ni
tuite
nimotu
no
airport
LOC
arrive-TE luggage GEN
kensa
o
uketa.
inspection ACC underwent
‘John arrived at the airport and underwent the inspection of his
luggage.’
TOP
c.zyon wa
marii ni
atte
sono hanasi o
sita.
meet-TE that talk
ACC did
‘John met Mary and talked about it (some matter).’
TOP
LOC
Gray (1983), who also disputes Kuno’s grammaticality judgments for
the sentences in (27), points out that if the conjuncts have distinct locative or
temporal adjuncts, the sentences will be completely acceptable regardless of
any disagreement between the controllability of the predicates. Her examples
are:
(30) a.zyon wa
me o
samasite zyuppun-go
ni
eye ACC wake-TE ten.minutes.later LOC
kao o
aratta.
face ACC washed
‘John woke up and ten minutes later he washed his face.’
TOP
b. zyon wa
miti
de guuzen
deatte
street LOC accidentally run.into-TE
tikaku no
kissaten
de
sono hanasi o
sita.
nearby GEN coffee.shop LOC that talk
ACC
did
‘John ran into Mary in the street and talked about it (with her) in
a coffee shop nearby.’
TOP
marii ni
LOC
Gray, working in the framework of RRG, attributes the effect of these
adjuncts to a difference in level of juncture; she suggests that Kuno’s claim
may be valid only when the linking is at core level. In the early version of
RRG used by Gray (e.g. Foley and Van Valin 1984), it was assumed that
peripheral constituents, e.g. setting locative and temporal phrases, must all be
part of the outermost unit and therefore have all linked cores in their scope.15
15 RRG researchers were aware of counterexamples, e.g. ‘Yesterday, Fred persuaded
John to wash his car in the river tomorrow’. However, such sentences were considered to be exceptions, ‘licensed in some way by the constituent structure which
English has overlaying the more basic layered structure’ (Van Valin 1987:2).
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
195
However, in the current version of RRG, there is no evidence for the claim that
(27) and (30) involve different levels of juncture. In the current version of
RRG, the periphery is considered to be linked to the core as a kind of modifier,
but not to be superior to the core. Thus, possession of an independent periphery is no longer taken to be a diagnostic for the level of juncture. (See
Watters (1987) and Van Valin (1987) for further discussion.)
In (27), the first core does not hold any adverbial relation to the second,
and the only naturally inferable semantic relation is TEMPORAL SEQUENCE.
Contrary to the widely accepted claim, I have argued that TEMPORAL SEQUENCE per se cannot be naturally expressed by TE-linkage by itself. It is the
addition of zyuppun-go ni ‘ten minutes later’ in (30a), and not TE-linkage
alone, which indicates a TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation, thereby causing
the sentences to be perceived as natural. In (30b), tikaku no kissaten de ‘at a
nearby coffee shop’ implies a change of location and, in consequence, a
TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation. It is because TE-linkage itself does not
have the ability to express a TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation that ‘bare’
TE-linkage with such a semantic relation creates an awkward impression, as
observed in (27).
Let us now apply Principle (26) to Kuno’s sentences in (27). In all the
sentences in (27), C1 is a non-action, while C2 is an action, and
(SUBJ1=SUBJ2). Under such circumstances, according to Principle (26),
C1 can only be construed as the REASON for the action C2. The anomaly in
(27) boils down to the question of what is and is not an acceptable reason
explanation. Consider the following conversations, which are English constructs similar to (27):
(31) a. A: Why did you wash your face?
B: Because I woke up.
b. A: Why did you call home?
B: Because I arrived at the airport.
c. A: Why did you talk to Mary about it?
B: Because I accidentally ran into her.
While all three conversations sound somewhat strange to me, (31a) sounds
the worst and (31b) the best, and the differences reflect the varying plausibility of the reasons presented in the three sequences. Interestingly, there
seems to be a correlation between these judgments and the grammaticality
judgments of (27). I feel that (27b) is slightly better than the others, and that
(27a) is the worst of all. (When the asserted reason is blatantly inappropriate,
it can even create a comical effect, e.g. to answer the question ‘Why are you
going to divorce?’ with ‘Because we got married.’) On this view, if C1
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
counts as an acceptable reason (explicitly or implicitly) for performing C2, a
disagreement in controllability should not affect the acceptability of the
sentence. The sentences in (32) confirm this prediction.
(32) a
saihu o
nakusite tomodati ni okane o
karita.
purse ACC loose-TE friend
DAT money ACC
borrowed
‘(I) lost (my) purse and borrowed money from a friend.’
b. kega
o
site
isya
ni
itta.
injury ACC do-TE doctor LOC went
‘(I) got injured and went to see a doctor.’
Although C1 is non-self-controllable and C2 is self-controllable in both
(32a) and (32b), the sentences are perfectly natural and acceptable.
Kuno’s controllability constraint, accordingly, cannot be upheld as a
syntactic principle. Rather, the awkwardness of his anomalous examples is
due to the discrepancy between the principles of interpretation governing
TE-linkage, on the one hand, and the interpreter’s standard regarding what
counts as a plausible reason, on the other.
6.
ABDUCTIVE INTERPRETATION OF REALITY
AND CONTRASTIVE RELATION
Comparing the usages of the connectives TE and to,16 R. Hamada (1985:177)
proposes an interesting generalization for TE-linkage. Although her formulation is rather vague,17 it seems possible to interpret it as follows: while to is
utilized when the speaker reports two successive situations from a mere
observer’s point of view, TE is utilized when the speaker has internalized
(‘digested’, as Hamada puts it) the situations. In this subsection I will attempt
to elaborate on this generalization, which captures native speakers’ intuitions
about TE-linkage.
16 For a detailed analysis of to, see S. Fujii (1991a, b).
17 Her original claim reads, ‘to no bun de wa, tuzuite okoru zen-kooken o, hanasite
wa autosaidaa-teki ni mite iru no ni taisite, te no bun de wa, sono kotogara o, hanasite
ga zisin no utigawa de syooka site hatuwa site iru no de aru (With a to-sentence, the
speaker is looking at the succession of events from an outsider’s point of view,
whereas with a te-sentence, s/he presents the events after s/he has digested them)’
(translation mine).
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
6.1.
197
Abductive Reasoning
TE-linkage indicates that the speaker has abductively determined the principle which governs the two linked situations, and expresses the situations in
the light of this interpretation.18 The abductive mode of inference differs
significantly from traditional deduction and induction, and thus requires
clarification. Deduction applies a principle (law) to an observed case and
predicts a result, e.g. (33); induction proceeds from observed cases to establish a principle, e.g. (34).
(33)
Principle:
Observation:
Inference:
All linguists are sarcastic.
Ali’s wife is a linguist.
Therefore, she must be sarcastic.
(34)
Observation:
Observation:
Observation:
Beth is a linguist and sarcastic.
Chris is a linguist and sarcastic.
Doris is a linguist and sarcastic.
•
•
•
Principle:
Therefore, all/most linguists are sarcastic.
By contrast, ‘abduction proceeds from an observed result, invokes a law, and
infers that something may be the case’ (Andersen 1973:775). The reasoning
in (35), for example, involves an abductive inference.
(32)
Observation:
Invoked Principle:
Inference:
This article is nasty.
All/Most linguists are nasty.
Therefore, this article might well have been
written by a linguist.
Note that a given situation (result) can in general evoke many different
principles. One might, for example, have invoked the principle that people
usually become nasty when they are hungry; then the inference would be that
the writer might have been hungry when s/he wrote the article.
The invoked principle need not be something that is already known, but
can be something that is conjectured on the spot — any inferred principle that
makes sense out of the original observation. The crucial step lying at the heart
of all abductive reasoning is the choice of some particular principle, a choice
18 The notion of abduction, originally proposed by Charles S. Peirce, was introduced
into linguistics circles by Henning Andersen (1973b).
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
which is inevitably subjective and context-dependent.
With TE-linkage, the speaker mentally juxtaposes two situations which
evoke some principle. S/he then conjoins the corresponding clauses with TE,
assuming that this same principle will be evoked in the addressee’s mind. For
example, in (16a), restated as (36), the speaker has observed a bad economic
situation and an increase in the unemployment rate; these two states of affairs
have evoked in his/her mind the principle that bad economic situations cause
the unemployment rate to increase; the speaker now presents the two situations with TE-linkage, assuming that the addressee will interpret the clauses as
standing in a CAUSE relation to one another.
(36)
keeki
ga
warukute situgyooritu
ga
economic.situation NOM be.bad-TE unemployment.rate NOM
agatta.
increased
‘Because the economic situation was bad, the unemployment rate
increased.’
Had the speaker failed to recognize a CAUSE relation between the bad
economic situation and the increase in the unemployment rate, s/he would
simply have reported the co-occurrence as such, using not TE but the more
natural conjunction to, as shown in (36).
(36) keeki
ga
warui to
situgyooritu
economic.situation NOM be.bad CONJ unemployment.rate
ga
agatta.
NOM increased
‘When the economic situation was bad, the unemployment rate
increased.’
Interestingly, (36) can also be used if the speaker thinks the addressee
may be unaware of the CAUSE relation, even though the speaker him/herself
is quite aware of it. This avoidance of TE, it would seem, counts as a very
subtle means of expressing politeness. This general politeness principle can
be illustrated with the usage of the sentence-final particles ne and yo. In
(37a), the particle ne indicates the speaker’s presupposition that the information is part of shared knowledge; in (37b), by contrast, the particle yo
indicates that the speaker considers the information new to the addressee.
(37) a.sono koto wa
kanto ga
itte imasu
that fact TOP Kant
NOM has.said
‘Kant has said that, hasn’t he?’
ne.
PRT
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
b. sono koto wa
kanto ga
that fact TOP Kant
NOM
‘(I tell you) Kant has said that.’
itte imasu
has.said
199
yo.
PRT
To assume the addressee’s ignorance of certain information, however, can be
impolite. Thus the speaker may deliberately choose (37a) even when s/he
knows that the addressee does not in fact have the information.
The same strategy of politeness can be involved in (36), but applied
differently. The speaker assumes that the naive addressee is not aware of the
CAUSE relation between a bad economic situation and a high unemployment
rate, and hence s/he too pretends not to be aware of it. The very fact that the
connective to can, but TE cannot, be used to express such subtle politeness
supports the claim that the use of TE must involve a logical inference of some
sort; for it is one’s own ‘superior’ ability to draw such an inference, and the
possibility that displaying this ability may shame the addressee, that leads the
speaker to avoid the TE-linkage here.
6.2.
CONTRASTIVE Relation
Another example of this abductive interpretation of reality is the CONTRASTIVE relation. The speaker observes two situations, e.g. Joan loves
Hiro and hates Maki, and these situations invoke the principle that love and
hate are CONTRASTIVE. As Cruse (1986:197) points out, it is somewhat
paradoxical that humans conceive oppositeness as a salient relation; he notes,
‘Of all relations of sense that semantics propose, that of oppositeness is
probably the most readily apprehended by ordinary speakers.’ T E-linkage
can be used to express the speaker’s conception of CONTRAST, as exemplified in the following sentences.
(38) a.ao-singoo de
hito
ya kuruma wa
susunde
blue.light LOC people and car
TOP
proceed-TE
aka de
teesi suru.
[Amerika]
red LOC stop
‘People and cars move on at the blue light and stop at the red
light.’
b. takikata
hitotu de yasui kome ga
oisiku
way.of.cooking one
PRT cheap rice
NOM be.tasty
natte
takai
kome mo
mazuku
naru.
become-TE expensive rice PRT be.unappetizing become
‘Depending on how the rice is cooked, cheap rice can be tasty
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
and expensive rice can be unappetizing.’
[Meigaramai]
c.zimintoo wa
antee-tasuu
o
kakuho site syakaitoo
firm.majority ACC hold-TE
JSP
wa teeraku ga
tuzuita.
[Kiken]
TOP decline
NOM continued
‘The Liberal Democratic Party secured a firm majority, as the
Japan Socialist Party continued its decline.’
LDP
TOP
In (38) no CAUSE or REASON relation is inferable, and there is no human
intention to connect the two situations; yet the sentences are natural. What
licenses TE-linkage in these cases is the fact that the collocated situations are
not arbitrarily chosen by the speaker. Here, again, TE-linkage indicates the
speaker’s conceptualization of two aspects of the surrounding reality as being
related in some principled way.
In (38a-b), the two situations are naturally understood as contrastive
because of the inverse lexical properties of the predicates susum- ‘proceed’
and teesi-s- ‘stop’ on the one hand, and oisiku nar- ‘become tasty’ and mazuku nar- ‘become unappetizing’ on the other. The CONTRASTIVE relation
may require more reasoning than that involved in a simple lexical contrast,
however. In fact, discovering a CONTRASTIVE relation frequently involves
an abductive reasoning process, as in (38c). In (38c) the interpreter must
invoke the principles that for a political party to secure a firm majority requires gaining sufficient votes, and that for it to decline indicates a loss of
votes. When this much of the inference has been made, then recognizing a
CONTRASTIVE relation becomes a matter of lexical contrast (gain vs. loss).
Kuno (1973:195-96) claims that the sentences in (39) are ungrammatical. While (39a) is indeed unacceptable, (39b), which involves a CONTRASTIVE relation, is perfectly acceptable to me.
(39) a.#zyon
wa
zibun o
nikunde hito
o
self ACC hate-TE people ACC
‘John hated himself and hated others.’
TOP
b. zyon wa
nikunde zyeen
hate-TE
‘John hates Mary and loves Jane.’
TOP
marii o
ACC
o
ACC
nikunda.
hated
aisite iru.
is.loving
It is worth mentioning as a general rule that the use of TE-linkage is
extremely awkward when the same predicate is repeated, e.g. (39a). In such a
case, ren’yoo-linkage, instead of TE-linkage, must be employed, as illustrated
in the following sentences.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
201
(40) a.kiti
no
kana-ami
no
soto
ni
wa
base GEN wire.fence GEN outside LOC TOP
kika-syokubutu
no
seeyoo-tanpopo
ga
naturalized.plant GEN Western.dandelion NOM
saki
(#saite),
uti-gawa ni
wa
zairaisyu
grow(ren’yoo) (grow-TE) inside
LOC
TOP
native.kind
no
tanpopo
ga
saku, to
iu hiniku-na
GEN
dandelion NOM grow QUOT say ironic
huukee mo
atta.
[Ikego]
scene PRT there.was
‘There was an ironic scene of naturalized Western dandelions
growing outside the wire fence surrounding the base, and of
Japanese dandelions growing inside the base.’
b. tikugo
sigisen
de
wa
wakate
city.assembly.election LOC TOP young
noogyoosya no
daihyoo
ga
toosen si
farmer
GEN
representative NOM be.elected(ren’yoo)
(#toosen site)
niigata sigisen de wa anzen-syokuhin
be.elected-TE
LOC TOP safe.food
undoo
no
huzin ga
toosen sita.
[Seitô]
movement GEN woman NOM be.elected-PST
‘A representative of young farmers was elected to the Chikugo
City Assembly, and a woman active in the movement to keep
food free of chemical additives was elected to the Niigata City
Assembly.’
This is a peculiar constraint on TE-linkage and thus must be stated in its
description.
To sum up, through the use of TE-linkage the speaker presents the two
situations as being related in some principled way: causation, reason for an
action, intention of a single individual, or contrastiveness. This, in fact, is the
central usage of TE-linkage. The TE-linkage Interpretation Principle is revised accordingly, as follows.
(40)
TE-linkage Interpretation Principle (Revision 3)
if
ACTION (C2)
if
{–ACTION (C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON (SUBJ2, C1, C2)
else INTEND (SUBJ1, (C1 & C2))
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
else
{CAUSE (C1, C2)  CONTRAST (C1, C2)}
7.
SETTING AND THE ADCLAUSAL NATURE OF THE FIRST
CONJUNCT
7.1.
Topic-Worthiness
Thus far, it has been pointed out that mere incidental TEMPORAL SEQUENCE
is incompatible with TE-linkage. Thus (42) is anomalous.
(42) #watasi
I
ga
NOM
uti
o
home ACC
dete
ame ga
hutte
kita.
leave-TE rain NOM fall-TE
came
‘I left home, and it began raining.’
(Endô 1982)
However, reversing the order of the clauses and the use of wa with watasi
make the sentence slightly better.19 Those who consider (43) acceptable are
likely to have a REASON relation in mind.
(43) ?ame ga
hutte
kite
watasi wa
rain NOM fall-TE come-TE I
TOP
‘It began raining, and I left home.’
uti
o
home ACC
deta.
left
Furthermore, replacing the first clause in (42) (action) with a natural event
makes the sentence perfectly acceptable, as shown in (44).
(44)
hi ga
kurete ame ga
hutte
kita.
sun NOM set-TE rain NOM fall-TE came
‘The sun set, and it began raining.’
The difference in naturalness between (42), on the one hand, and (43, 44) on
the other is due to the fact that the first subject in (42), viz. the speaker, is
more topic-worthy than in (43, 44), viz. rain and the sun.
Determination of topic-worthiness involves several factors: the natural
topic hierarchy of Hawkinson and Hyman (1974), Givón’s case hierarchy
(1976) and intrinsic topicality hierarchy (1979), the agency hierarchy of
Silverstein (1976) and Comrie (1981), and the topic acceptability scale of
Lambrecht (1986). Other things being equal, the following hierarchy of
topic-worthiness generally holds:
19 Note that just substituting wa for ga in (42), without reversing the order, does not
affect the naturalness.
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
203
(45)
Topic-Worthiness Hierarchy
Human (first/second person) > Human (third person) >
Animate Nonhuman > Inanimate
Furthermore, in general, when conjoining clauses, the subject of the first
clause should not be more topic-worthy than the subject of the second clause.
This asymmetry between conjuncts stems from the universal tendency to
place heavier weight on the second conjunct in conjoined structures. Van
Dijk (1977:41) points out that the general meaning of connectives is to
connect clauses C1 and C2 in such a way that C1 specifies the situation under
which C2 is true. Sentences which violate this relation result in anomaly, e.g.
‘#We played in the waves and were at the beach.’ He also argues that in order
to make sense out of merely juxtaposed clauses, it is usually necessary to
supply a context which specifies the ‘when, where, or why’ of the conjuncts.
For example, in order to interpret ‘Mary knitted, and the fire was burning,’ the
interpreter needs to presuppose some proposition which specifies a general
topological (spatial) identity for C1 and C2 such as ‘I came into the room.’
In the anomalous sentence (42), there is no obvious relation between C1
(the speaker’s leaving home) and C2 (onset of rain); further, the subject of C1
is highest on the topic-worthiness hierarchy. The anomaly is thus due to the
unnaturalness of providing a frame-work (or background information) for C2
that is cast in terms of the most topic-worthy entity. In other words, selecting
first or second person whenever possible as subject of C2 will make the
discourse more cohesive and more acceptable because first/second person is
the most topic-worthy entity among all event participants. Hopper and
Thompson (1980:286) state a similar idea: ‘The prominence of the properties
of Agency and Volitionality in foregrounding derives from the fact that story
lines are typically advanced by people who perform actions, and especially by
people who deliberately initiate events.’
7.2.
SETTING Relation
When a TE-linked C1 supplies a framework for C2, the relevant semantic
contribution of C1 is to introduce a spatio-temporal setting or an intrasentential topic entity. I call this relation SETTING, as exemplified by the following sentences.
(46) a.tuite
atari
o
mimawasu to
toritome mo nai
arrive-TE vicinity ACC look.around CONJ boundless
hirosa
datta.
[Amerika]
vastness COP-PST
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
‘Arriving (there), (I) looked around and found unbounded
vastness.’
b. meezi
ni
haitte
hanebuton
no
gyoosya
Meiji.Era LOC enter-TE feather.bedding GEN maker
ga
ahoodori o
bokusatu sita.
[Hogochô]
NOM albatross ACC
clubbed.to.death
‘In the beginning of (lit. entering) the Meiji Era, makers of
bedding clubbed albatrosses to death (for their feathers).’
hyoosite
“kono mati wa sirokuzi-tyuu
comment-TE this town TOP always
dokoka
de
kanarazu me o
aite iru...” to
somewhere LOC necessarily eye ACC is.opening QUOT
itta no
wa sizin no kusano sinpee de aru.
said NMLZ TOP poet GEN
COP be-NPST
‘Commenting on Shinjuku, it was poet Shimpei Kusano who said,
“This town always has its eyes open somewhere around the
clock.”’
[Beni-san]
c.sinzyuku o
ACC
d. ubamegasi nado
no
kurai midori no
naka
ni
ilex
and.alike GEN dark green GEN inside LOC
atte
sakura no
saku
atari dake wa botto
be-TE cherry GEN bloom site
only TOP dimly
akarui.
[Izu]
bright
‘Amid the dark green of the ilex, the cherry blossoms were dimly
bright.’
In fact, C1 is adclausal to C2 in most clause-level TE-constructions.
That is, C1 functions interclausally vis-à-vis C2 in a way similar to the intraclausal functioning of an adverbial vis-à-vis its verb. C1 provides the
CAUSE or REASON or SETTING for C2.
8.
SUMMARY
The occurrence of TE-linkage with core or clausal juncture indicates that the
speaker views the two linked situations as unified by some abductively
identifiable principle, not as a mere succession in time. As with other (i.e.
non-TE) linkage types, the second conjunct has heavier weight in terms of
Chapter 6: TE-Linkage with Clausal Juncture
205
topicality, and thus the first conjunct is adclausal to the second. The primary
determinant in deciding how to interpret such linkages is the agentivity of the
second predicate. If it is agentive (i.e. action), then the interpreter considers
whether or not the first conjunct also indicates an action and whether or not
the two subjects are identical. If the first conjunct denotes a nonaction or the
subjects are distinct, the unmarked interpretation is that the first conjunct
indicates the REASON for the action expressed by the second conjunct. If
both conjuncts denote actions and have identical subjects, the unmarked
interpretation is that the speaker’s motivation for using TE-linkage is that both
actions were INTENDed by the subject referent. If the second conjunct does
not refer to an action, then three possibilities emerge: the conjuncts hold a
CAUSE or a CONTRASTIVE relation, or the first conjunct is intended to
supply the SETTING in which the second conjunct is to be interpreted. This
procedure is summarized in (47).
(47)
TE-Linkage Interpretation Principle (Penultimate Version)
if
ACTION (C2)
if
{–ACTION (C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON (SUBJ2, C1, C2)
else INTEND (SUBJ1, (C1 & C2))
else {CAUSE (C1, C2)  CONTRAST (C1, C2) 
SETTING (C1, C2)}
CHAPTER 7
CONCLUDING REMARKS
In this study we have investigated the syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic
properties of TE-linkage. This final chapter will summarize our findings and
return to the issues raised in Chapter 1.
TE-constructions play a major role in the grammar of Japanese, and
accordingly they have been investigated by numerous researchers. However,
the objective of most previous studies has been to investigate either a single
TE-construction in isolation, e.g. the TE I- construction,1 a subset of those
TE-constructions that involve nuclear juncture, 2 or only TE-constructions
involving core or clausal juncture.3 Most such studies, furthermore, have
been conducted mainly from a purely syntactic4 or a purely semantic and/or
pragmatic perspective. 5 To my knowledge, the present study is the first
attempt to describe, and to some extent account for, all types of TE-linkage,
with a special focus on the relationship between their syntax and semantics.
This attempt is of special significance in investigations of connective
devices in general, and of TE in particular. A major problem with previous
investigations of TE-linkage is that they have been based on imprecise and
simplistic assumptions. Implicit in many previous studies, for example, is
1 T. Takahashi (1969), Teramura (1969), Ôta (1971), T. Fujii (1976), Kindaichi
(1976), Yoshikawa (1976), Ôkura (1977), Jacobsen (1979, 1982, 1991), Kamiya
(1979), Sekine (1983), S. Takahashi (1984), K. Matsumoto (1985).
2 Watanabe (1970), Makiuchi (1972), M. Inoue (1974), Toyoda (1974), Moriguchi
(1975), Miyara (1981), Ishikawa (1985), McCawley and Momoi (1986), Lee (1989),
Sells (1990).
3 NLRI (1951), Negishi (1970), Kuno (1973), Endô (1982), Narita (1983),
Matsuda (1985).
4 M. Inoue (1974), Shibatani (1978), Nakajima (1981), Miyara (1981), Ishikawa
(1985), McCawley and Momoi (1986), Lee (1989), Y. Matsumoto (1990b), Sells
(1990).
5 NLRI (1951), T. Fujii (1976), Ôkura (1977), Morita (1980), Endô (1982), R.
Hamada (1985), M. Hamada (1989), Y. Matsumoto (1990a,c), Hasegawa (1992,
1993).
Chapter 7: Concluding Remarks
207
the common assumption that TE is an inflectional (gerundive) suffix. However, as this study has demonstrated, when the first conjunct is negated, TE is
suffixed to the negative morpheme, not directly to the predicate, forming
nai-de or naku-te. An inflectional suffix cannot be separated from the stem in
this way. Thus TE must be considered to be a connective suffix.
Another common assumption is that TE is a coordination device.
However, as demonstrated in various places in this book, TE-linkage exhibits
features characteristic of both coordination and subordination in the traditional dichotomy of linkage types. Furthermore, many researchers have
contended that TE-constructions involving ‘auxiliary’ verbs belong to a
completely different category from other types. This obscures the very nature
of the notion ‘connective construction’ in natural language. One of our tasks
is to make explicit the ways in which verbal constituents of any sort can be
linked in natural language, thus shedding light on our cognitive faculty. TE is
the most versatile connective in Japanese, for it is the only morpheme which
can link units at all three of the juncture levels posited by Role and Reference
Grammar: nuclear, core, and clausal. Therefore, the method utilized in this
study should be extendible to investigations of other, more restricted connective constructions as well.
Needless to say, TE-linkage encompasses a wide variety of semantic
relations. However, close examination of the syntax of TE-linkage has revealed that there are clear correlations between its syntax and semantics, and
that the semantics is in large part determined by the syntactic type of the
conjuncts. Such correlations have been obscured in previous studies because
such studies failed to investigate TE-linkage as a set of grammatical constructions, i.e. as pairings of form and meaning. The present study has
demonstrated that grammatical constructions are indispensable in linguistic
analysis and description, and that they can easily be incorporated into the RRG
formalism used herein.
Theoretically, most TE-constructions are potentially ambiguous as to
what kind of units are conjoined, and hence many researchers have contended, explicitly or implicitly, that TE-linkage is purely a syntactic device
without any semantic content (i.e. implicature-only analysis, cf. Chapter 1
§3). However, in actual speech ambiguities rarely emerge because when
native listeners encounter a TE-construction, their tacit linguistic knowledge
enables them to detect subtle cues for identifying what kind of juncture is
intended by the speaker. In this book, we have discussed numerous such cues
— among them phonological phrasing, argument structure, scope of potential
operators, and agentivity of the predicates. The following sections provide
summaries of TE-linkage at the three juncture levels.
208
1.
A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
NUCLEAR JUNCTURE
In Chapters 3 and 4 we investigated TE-linkage with nuclear juncture.
Whereas when two cores or clauses are linked, the semantics of the
TE-linkage is a relationship between two propositions, when two nuclei are
linked, the semantics is a relationship between the denotations of two predicates. In this respect, nuclear juncture is significantly different from the
other linkage types. This difference is represented in both traditional
grammar and many contemporary syntactic theories in such a way that all
second nuclei in TE-linkage are presented as ‘auxiliaries’. Such auxiliaries,
however, do not behave uniformly: one type does not affect the valence of the
TE-predicate, but a second type does. Therefore, two distinct types of nuclear
linkage must be recognized.
In a RRG analysis of TE-linkage with nuclear juncture, the linked nuclei
must be either in coordination or subordination. In coordination the two
nuclei jointly specify a single set of core arguments. The particular selection
of core arguments from among those appearing in the Logical Structures of
the linked predicates is idiosyncratic, and thus must be stated separately for
each nuclear-coordination TE-construction. In subordination the matrix
nucleus alone determines the core-argument structure, and the subordinate
nucleus modifies the matrix core, as an adverbial clause does vis-à-vis the
matrix clause. The main functions of TE-linked subordinate nuclei overlap
with those posited in RRG for nuclear operators; thus nuclear-subordination
TE-constructions are considered in this study to be operator constructions. In
both coordination and subordination, the first nucleus can be independently
negated by the nuclear-level operator nai-de, whereas the core operator
naku-te can never intervene between linked nuclei.
Nuclear juncture is the tightest verbal linkage in syntax, and linked
nuclei denote a single concept. Semantically, therefore, they resemble lexical
compounds. Syntactically, however, nuclear linkage and lexical compounds
exhibit distinct characteristics. While a few particles as well as nai-de can
intervene between linked nuclei, no intervention whatever is permitted between lexically compounded constituents. Nuclear juncture thus must be kept
separate from core or clausal juncture on the one hand, and from lexical
compounds on the other.
There are twelve verbals which can appear as second predicate in nuclear juncture with TE. Four of them were examined in this study — simaw‘put into an appropriate place’ and ar- ‘be located (inanimate)’ (Chapter 3),
and k- ‘come’ and ik- ‘go’ (Chapter 4). Simaw- is always linked with the
TE-predicate in nuclear subordination. Thus nuclear-linked simaw- never
affects the valence of the matrix TE-predicate, but modifies the aspect and/or
Chapter 7: Concluding Remarks
209
agentivity of the matrix TE-predicate; it may also simultaneously imply the
speaker’s regret or surprise regarding the proposition or speech act expressed
by the entire clause. On the other hand, ar-, k-, and ik- can be linked with the
TE-predicate in either subordination or coordination. When in subordination,
they qualify the aspect and/or directionality of the TE-predicate. When in
coordination, they license an extra ni-marked locative to appear inside the
core. Although not examined in this book, three ‘donatory’ verbs — age‘give’, kure- ‘give’, and moraw- ‘receive’ — are always linked to the
TE-predicate in nuclear coordination, typically adding to the core a goal or
beneficiary argument (with age- and kure-) or a source argument (with
moraw-).
When two verbals are adjacent and the second is one of the twelve
verbals compatible with nuclear TE-linkage, the unmarked parsing is with
nuclear juncture. However, because Japanese permits a high degree of ellipsis, two verbals may appear side by side even when the linkage is actually
at the core or clause level. With such an elliptical sentence, the speaker must
provide a cue of some sort for any marked (i.e. core or clausal) parsing,
generally by the insertion of a major-phrase boundary.
2.
CORE JUNCTURE
Chapter 5 examined TE-linkage with core juncture. At the core level, TE can
link cores in all three nexus types — subordination, coordination, and
cosubordination. In core subordination, the TE-marked core as a whole is an
argument of the matrix core. A small number of verbals, e.g. i- ‘be permitted’, sum- ‘be settled’, and daizyoobu+COP ‘be all right’, may take such an
argument. The information as to which predicate can take a TE-marked core
argument is not predictable solely from the predicate’s semantics, and must
therefore be stated in the lexicon. The semantic relation between the linked
cores is determined by the matrix core (as is also the case with complement
subordination at the clause level).
In core coordination, the conjuncts denote two independent propositions which share the argument that is encoded as their subject. The semantics of such TE-linkage depends in large part on the agentivity of the
conjuncts. If both cores denote actions (i.e. both agentive), the speaker’s
motivation for the use of TE-linkage is that both actions are INTENDed by the
same individual. If, on the other hand, the first core denotes a non-action and
the second an action, the implied semantic relation is REASON. Otherwise,
the semantic relation will be CONCESSIVE, CAUSE, CONTRASTIVE, or
SETTING according to the meanings of the conjuncts. The kind of semantic
relations involved here is in accordance with the fact that coordinated cores
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
are syntactically and semantically independent of each other; the semantic
relations just listed are what humans perceive between two separable situations, not between two aspects of a single situation. When both cores denote
dynamic situations, the sentence conversationally implicates a TEMPORAL
SEQUENCE relation. In core coordination, the first conjunct can be independently negated by naku-te, and a negative operator appearing on the
second predicate has scope only over the second core.
In core cosubordination, by contrast, the conjuncts denote two aspects
of a single situation, with the first core serving as an adverbial modifier of the
second. Potential semantic relations include LOCATIVE, MEANS, MATERIAL, MANNER, and MEASURE. These relations (as well as CAUSE, which
requires coordination nexus) can be expressed by a de-marked NP if the NP
and the predicate jointly supply sufficient information to determine which
semantic relation is intended. If a negative operator appears on the second
predicate, its scope ranges over both conjuncts, negating the semantic relation
obtaining between them.
Whether or not to exclude from the semantic description of TE-linkage
those relations discussed in this study, by considering them as (conventional
or conversational) implicature, depends on the analyst’s conviction regarding
what is to count as ‘semantics’. If one adheres strictly to truth-functional
semantics, these semantic relations could properly belong to pragmatics; if
one subscribes, as the present author does, to what Fillmore (1985b) advocates as the semantics of understanding, these semantic relations must be
stated in the semantic description of TE-linkage.
3.
CLAUSAL JUNCTURE
Chapter 6 was devoted largely to clausal juncture, but was also concerned
with the coordination nexus at the core level. In TE-linkage, if both subjects
are present, the juncture is at the clause level. If either or both of the subjects
are missing, the juncture is usually at the core level and disjoint reference is
prohibited. However, there are several morpholexical means in Japanese for
delimiting potential human subject referents even in the absence of an NP, e.g.
the use of an honorific predicate or psych-predicate. With such a predicate, a
switch in subject reference is explicitly signaled by the choice of predicate
even when there is no overt subject, and accordingly the juncture is understood to be at clause level. With ‘ordinary’ predicates, by contrast, a covert
subject must be coreferential with a preceding or following overt or covert
subject, and thus the linkage is interpreted to be at core level.
At the clause level, TE-linkage always involves cosubordination, because all clause-level TE-constructions exhibit operator dependency: using
Chapter 7: Concluding Remarks
211
the imperative operator nasai as a diagnostic, we confirmed that both clauses
are indeed in the scope of this operator. At the clause level, the conjuncts and
TE jointly implicate a CAUSE, REASON, CONTRASTIVE, or SETTING relation, again according to the semantics of the conjuncts.
4.
TE-LINKAGE INTERPRETATION PRINCIPLE
If we attribute all semantic relations compatible with TE-linkage to the
TE-linkage itself, rather than considering them to be implicatures that must be
worked out on the basis of some as-yet-undiscovered pragmatic principles,
the grammar of TE-linkage as a whole is greatly simplified; for many particular facts about the behavior of TE now fall out automatically as consequences of other, more general parts of the analysis. For example, the fact
that the LOCATIVE, MEANS, MATERIAL, MANNER, and MEASURE relations
can be expressed only by core cosubordination need not be simply stated as an
arbitrary stipulation, but can be derived as an entailment from the inherent
semantics of these relations. For, by their very nature, these semantic relations require that the two conjuncts have identical subjects — which is part of
the definition of non-embedded core linkage — and that the conjuncts do not
denote two separate propositions — which excludes a parsing with core
coordination. (The MEANS relation, for instance, is such that some one
individual does something by means of doing something else: a clause with
this relation does not express the idea that one does two things.) This entailment regarding juncture and nexus type (core cosubordination) in turn
entails that the first conjunct can contain the nuclear operator nai-de, but it
cannot be independently negated with the core-level naku-te.
On the other hand, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE can be implicated by
TE-linkage only when two actions denoted by conjuncts are performed by a
single individual, as discussed in Chapter 6. Because this prerequisite is not a
normal property of the TEMPORAL SEQUENCE relation, TEMPORAL SEQUENCE should not be included in the semantic description of TE. Indeed, as
remarked several times, TE-linkage is not compatible with a TEMPORAL
SEQUENCE relation per se.
As mentioned in various places in this book, TE is the most frequently
occurring connective in Japanese, and a great many semantic relations are
expressible by it. Nonetheless, the use of TE does not cause communicative
difficulties. To be sure, discourse context (and implicature therefrom) provides a great deal of information about the intended relation, but it does not
tell the whole story. TE and the conjuncts jointly narrow down the range of
possible interpretations, either by designating a particular relation or by
filtering out irrelevant relations. I therefore reject the implicature-only
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
analysis, which would derive all the semantics of TE-linkage by implicature.
In Chapter 6, I proposed an interpretive principle for TE-linked clauses.
To conclude this study, I will re-present it here in its final version. The
principle requires reference to both syntax and semantics; this mixture of two
kinds of concepts is justified simply because, in actual interpretation, both are
simultaneously available to language users. In (1), NJP stands for Nuclear
Juncture Predicates, i.e. the set of predicates which can appear as second
predicate in nuclear juncture, and MPB stands for Major-Phrase Boundary.
(1) TE-Linkage Interpretation Principle (Final Version)
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
if {Adjacent (PRED1, PRED2) & NJP (PRED2) & –MPB}
then Nuclear-Linkage (PRED1, PRED2)
else if ACTION (C2)
if {–ACTION (C1)  (SUBJ1  SUBJ2)}
then REASON (SUBJ2, C1, C2)
else if
Cosubordination (CORE1, CORE2)
then {LOCATIVE (C1, C2) 
MEANS (C1, C2) 
MATERIAL (C1, C2) 
MANNER (C1, C2) 
MEASURE (C1, C2)}
else INTEND (SUBJ1, (C1 & C2))
else {CAUSE (C1, C2)  CONTRAST (C1, C2) 
SETTING (C1, C2)}
Lines 1 and 2 refer to nuclear TE-linkage: if two predicates are juxtaposed without a major-phrase boundary and PRED2 is one of those which
can appear as second predicate in nuclear juncture, then the linkage must be at
nuclear level. The interpreter must employ the lexical knowledge of PRED2
to identify the particular semantic relation intended.
Lines 3 and following refer to core or clausal TE-linkage. Lines 3-5
state: if C2 is an action and C1 a non-action, or if C2 is an action and SUBJ1
and SUBJ2 have disjoint reference, then C1 is the reason for SUBJ2 performing C2.
Lines 6-11 abbreviate the following: if C2 is an action and SUBJ1 and
SUBJ2 are coreferential, then parse the sentence with cosubordination, unless
there is specific evidence to the contrary — e.g. the occurrence of naku-te,
signaling core coordination, or occurrence of an emphatic major-phrase
boundary, e.g. a H tone on TE itself or longer pause. With this parsing, the
semantic relation is understood to be a qualification of C2 by C1 — LOCATIVE, MEANS, MATERIAL, MANNER, or MEASURE. Further explanation
Chapter 7: Concluding Remarks
213
for this strategy in parsing lines 6-11 will be given shortly. Line 12 states: if
parsing with cosubordination results in an unacceptable interpretation, the
intended semantic relation is likely to be that both C1 and C2 are related by
virtue of being intentionally performed by the same individual.
When a TE-sentence is ambiguous, Japanese speakers ordinarily prefer
to interpret [CORE1-TE CORE2] as cosubordination rather than coordination.
An anecdotal illustration of this is the fact that in a project on Japanese clause
linkage, (2) was unanimously translated as (A) by six bilingual native
speakers of Japanese, including the present author.
(2) gomukan
rubber.tube
hi
o
fire ACC
o
ACC
pintikokku de
pinch.cock PRT
kesu.
extinguish
tomete
choke.off.a.flow-TE
[Rika, modified]
A: ‘By pinching the rubber tube with a pinch-cock, extinguish the
flame.’
(Cosubordination Parsing)
B: ‘Pinch the rubber tube with a pinch-cock, and extinguish the
flame.’
(Coordination Parsing)
The sentence in (2), taken from a high-school science textbook, is part of an
experiment procedure. In this experiment, two rubber tubes are used: one
connecting a gas pipe and a burner, and the other a flask and a glass tube. As
remarked, our initial response to (2) was to adopt the cosubordination reading
(A). However, after careful consideration, we recognized that ( A) would
instruct the students to turn off the gas flame by an unusual and dangerous
procedure, a procedure which should not appear in a science textbook. Thus,
upon reflection, we rejected (A) and took the ‘rubber tube’ to be the one
connecting the flask and the glass tube. Note that when we first translated (2),
we were totally aware of the linguistic and extralinguistic context, and yet
employed the unmarked parsing strategy (cosubordination) because pinching
the tube can extinguish the flame. That is, (A) is neither semantically nor
pragmatically anomalous; that it was rejected was simply a contingent matter
of inappropriateness. This episode conveys how strong the tendency to adopt
a cosubordination parsing is. Note also that with cosubordination parsing,
more specific information can be obtained, for LOCATIVE, MEANS, MATERIAL, MANNER, and MEASURE are subtypes of INTEND.
The last two lines in (1) state that if the juncture is core or clause level
and C2 is not an action, then the conjuncts should hold a CAUSE, CONTRAST, or SETTING relation. As observed in (1), in core or clausal
TE-linkage, the agentivity of C2 is the most important feature in interpreting
the sentence. This is reasonable in light of the universal tendency to place
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A Study of Japanese Clause Linkage
heavier weight on the second conjunct (cf. Chapter 6 §7.1).
To be sure, the effective use of TE-linkage depends heavily on the human faculty of abductive inference. However, it would be over-simplification
to claim that all semantic relations compatible with TE-linkage can therefore
always be inferred. Abduction is an open-ended principle, and as such can be
misused. If one utilizes it, or TE-linkage, indiscriminately, the resultant
sentence
may
be
anomalous
or,
worse,
misunderstood.